Feathers and Bones
by wingkia
Summary: EDIT! I've done a re-cut of chapter 8, I hope that this one will be upto par.
1. Chapter 1

Untitled

Feathers and Bones

one: Star Light, Star Bright

Standard disclaimers….

AU/cross over as well as a touch of what if… between Macross, and Gundam Seed universes.

I'm aiming to have Murrue X OC, mostly since she is my favourite character, and I hated seeing her get jerked around so bad, between GS, and GSD.

The OC charter's mecha the VF-27 Typhoon has a look much like the General Galaxy VF-22 Sturmvogel II, with some miner changes, like particle cannons mounted in the body.

So if it doesn't seem very GS/GSD at the start, well that's because I'm just setting the stage.

Right, so on with the show.

"Jolly Roger 01, I have the ball." called the pilot as he brought his Variable technology fighter, VF for shot, in for a landing on the Uraga class escort carrier, after a long patrol.

"Copy, Jolly Roger 01 has the ball." Replied the L.S.O. (Landing Safety Officer) whom was standing just off to the left of the flight path for the returning fighters.

With a grate shaking of the flight deck, even in the depths of space, the VF-27 Typhoon, announced that it had made the trap onto the flight deck of the ship.

The L.S.O. watched as 'Jolly Roger 01' taxied the fighter around on the flight deck, towards one of the elevators, and it struck her as funny, _Even after almost 200 years since Space War One, we still use ships that look like they'd belong in an ocean rather then deep space like this. Hell even our latest and greatest fighters look like they should be flying in a sky, rather then space, but I guess that has more to due with the fact that they can do just that, space or at-mo fighting…_

As the Typhoon neared the elevator 'Jolly Roger 01' sighed how he wished these carriers were bigger the hanger area of the ship was so cramped with fully 96 fighters and bombers below decks, space was a premium.

The Typhoon it's self shared a lot with it's older progenitor the old VF-22 Sturmvogel II, she was every bit the predator that her elder sibling was, just with another 40 years of technological development behind her.

Once the elevator had reached the hanger deck 'Jolly Roger 01' taxied the Typhoon into it's place at the far end of the deck, once their the engines stopped their high pitched wine, and the canopy opened up, as the pilot removed their black, white and yellow helmet that bore the same Skull and Cross bones on either side of where the ears would be, as the helmet touched the H.U.D. (Heads UP Display) they took a deep breath, _It may be recycled air, but it beats the on-board air-supply…_

"Commander Kross, did you see any action out there today?" asked the ground tech as she saw too placing the ground chocks so that the wheels couldn't move.

The pilot smiled a little, before speaking "Yea, only splashed four of them today though, I don't get what these people are thinking, they know that they've got equipment that is out of date, at least to what the military has, so why are they even trying to put up a fight…"

"Well Sir, if you ask me, I think they should just give up, this Anti-Government movement just doesn't make sense, I mean, we all depend on U.N. Spacey for everything…" the tech spoke again, as she brought the ladder over for Commander Kross to get out of they Typhoon.

Kross stood up, and placed a leg on the ladder well turning so that it was easier to descend, one on the ground the tech took up a spot behind, well she thought _I do love the way the flight gear hugs the male pilots, epically him, and to think, he got dumped…_

"Chief, are you there?" Spoke Kross, snapping the tech back to reality.

"Yes sir? Sorry, I was just thinking about something…." She said, with a slightly pink huge on her cheeks.

"I was just asking, if there had been any mail today, we've been out on the front-lines now almost a month, with no mail." He said as he flashed her a quick smile, he knew he was popular on the ship with the female crewmembers, hard not to be, with as they put it "classic good looks" to go along with copper blond hair and deep jade eyes.

"I think so sir, but I don't know off hand, but if I were you, I'd get some sleep, you've been pulling C.A.P. duty for the last two days in a row now…" she started to trail off as she watched him walking to the lockers, she leaned against the Typhoon and sighed a little envious of the aircraft, since it got to spend so much time with 'him'.

Steeping out of the showers, he walked over to his locker, labelled 'A. Kross', as he opened it, the first thing his eyes fell on, was his flight helmet, with the word "Reaper" written across it, in some gothic script, then over to the inside of the door, where all the pictures that he held dear to him, sat, one stood out against all others, it was of him and her, with her chocolate brown hair, porcelain like completion and eyes the colour of gold, smiling and laughing over something, that he couldn't remember after all these years, that was from a happier time, when they could both say those three little words, that made all the difference in the world, that was before they were posted apart, and he got a letter from her, saying that she wanted to call it off, that maybe they would be better off not together.

He sighed, inwardly as he reached for the white pants of his uniform, fallowed by the black high neck shirt, and jacket that was black with red markings, well showing on the arms his rank down at the cuffs.

Once dressed he walked out of the locker room, and proceeded unto the bridge of the ship, saluting either as he passed the various people he came across, as he entered the bridge, the Captain spoke, "ahh Alexander, how are you today m'boy?"

Alexander Kross, Lt. Commander of the United Nations Space Forces, (U.N. Spacy, was it's more common name, even if it was some 150 years out of date, since it was now more like United Worlds Space forces, but something things are hard to change.) Age 26, Fighter pilot and current Top-Gun, looked over the bridge, in typical U.N. Spacy fashion, something that hadn't changed since the first Battle Fortress, if the captain was male, then the bridge crew was female, and vice versa, he couldn't help but wink at the cute girl that couldn't have been more then 16 or 17 manning the communications position, before responding to the Captain, "I'm doing well sir, we engaged two squadrons of old Thunderbolts, but they couldn't hold up against our Typhoons…"

"You truly are a wonder Commander, but I've got news for you, you are being sent to Terra, for re-assignment, it's going to be pain-full have to give up, one of the best pilots I've seen in all my years of service, I remember you steeping off of the shuttle, fresh out of Flight School, and full of fire, now some ten years later, I've had the pleasure of watching you grow into a man, and a talented officer, if a little free spirited…" the captain spoke with a bit of a chuckle at the end.

"I'm being re-assigned, sir? But what about my Squadron?" Spoke Alexander, he eyes full of some surprise.

"Well, it would seem that your talents, and skill in dog-fighting are needed else where, at a training school to be more to the point, you've become to valuable to risk out here on the battle field, and I hope, that with you teaching combat manoeuvreswe'll see less loss of life… as for your squadron, you X.O., Lt. Ramins will be promoted to lead them, and I guess, I'll have to find me a new Commander Air Group too… such a pity, but those are our orders." The captain sighed before continuing "How ever, you will be flying back in your Typhoon, so at least you will get to take that much with you, make sure, since this is a long distance folds, that you take a copy of your personnel docket, as well as specs on the Typhoon, as you know, people do get 'lost' during long distance folds, just on the off chance something does go wrong, we'll also have your Typhoon loaded for combat, with a good spread of anti-fighter, and anti-ship weapons. Get some sleep you head out at 08:30 Terra standard time tomorrow."

Alexander saluted with a sharp and crisp, "Sir!" before spinning on his heel and walking off the bridge, to collect up his personal belongings.

He didn't sleep, how could he sleep, with so much work that had to be done, before he left the ship that had been his home for so long, having to say good by to so many people he'd become so close with, but he'd sleep on the flight back to Terra, the seat of Human Government, the catapult rocketed his fighter forward at a full 7G's, with his after-burners flaring as wide open as they could.

Once he was at a safe distance from the ship, he started in-putting the co-ordnance for Terra, but in his sleep deprived state, he hit a 7 when he should've hit a 4, not realising the error, he hit the enter button, thus started a chain reaction with in the Typhoon, there was a light hum as the fighter was enveloped in a sphere of multi-coloured light, then vanished from the space around it.

Murrue Ramius, sat up in her bed, looking out at the stars, thinking over the events of the last day, _I can't believe that this is all happening to me, here I am in a war, I started off just in the engineering section of an R&D group that was trying to level the field in this war, now I'm in command of a war-ship, that is drastically under-staffed, and half crewed by civilians…_

I wish you were here with me, I need your strength, but you can't give that to me, since you are dead now, floating some where in space… if I can get us to Artemis I can get this ship supplied, then it's just a short trip to the moon, and I can go back to being in the R&D section, no more being in command for me, at least not yet…

She stood and walked to the window, placing her right hand on the window, as if to touch the stars, well her left hand clutched her little amulet, hoping that in some strange way, it brought her closer to him.

"Captain Ramius to the bridge, Captain Ramius to the bridge!" came over the speaker in her room, from one of the civilians that had started working to help the ship through it's trials, she sighed, put on her uniform, and as she reached the door, she couldn't help but utter the words "no rest for the wicked."

As she floated onto the bridge, the dark haired Ensign, that always seemed to be at odds with her, spoke up, "Captain we've picked up, one Nazca class and one Laurasia class fallowing us, I think it's the same ones that have been dogging us since Heliopolis, I think they might attack us soon."

Sure enough, not twenty minuets had gone by, before they detected the launch of several mobile suites, with little time to waist they launched the one mobile suite they had, as well as the one mobile armour, Murrue hoped that they'd both be fine, and would come back alive, she didn't want to see any more death, not when they were barely a day and a half from safety.

Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep…

That was the sound the brought him from his slumber, he looked at his display, it was telling him, that he was about to de-fold into the Sol system, he shook off his sleepy-ness, and gripped the flight stick and throttle, as the Typhoon rocked and jolted violently, his head hit the dash and bounced off, if not for the helmet, he would've suffered a minor head injury for sure.

As the light vanished from around his Typhoon, he brought the manual systems on-line, and began to run the navigation system's self check to make sure he was in the right part of space, a few seconds later, the stars matched up, with where they should be, Sol system, January 26th….

He stared to run the radar systems up, to pick up, anything in the area, the pulse went out, now all he had to do, was wait for the returning pulse….

Sweating at his station Petty Officer 2ed class Tonomura, watched as a new signal just appeared, just 80 km off the port side of the Arc-Angel, and slightly high, he ran the data of this new target through the computer, but came up with no known model, he tagged it as a low threat target for now, but would watch it to see what happened.

As the pulse came back, Alexander read the information, three unknown ships, that was it, with in the 640km radius of his RADAR pulse, that alone was strange, it should've been a lot more then that, but what peeked his interest was that none of the ships had a known profile, not to mention the smaller craft that were engaged with each other.

Alexander turned his Typhoon towards the closest of the craft, and it was also the largest one, at least according to RADAR it was….

Petty Officer 2ed class Tonomura, noticed the unknown turn towards the Arc-Angel and start to close the distance at an almost un-real speed, faster then most missiles, that could be found in either the Earth Forces or ZAFT armouries, at least as far as he knew, with this new data, he had no choice but to make this object known, as he alerted the Ensign, she came over and watched the speed that the dot approached she spoke, "Has it started to target us with lasers yet?"

Those would prove to be the very last words she would udder before the object flew passed the bridge, the even the Igelstellungs couldn't keep up, with the tracking.

But perhaps the thing that drew all of the bridge crews attention was the two bright white-blue columns of flame shooting out behind the craft, as it shot passed them.

The dark haired Ensign's right hand accidentally landed on the fire button, for the anti-mobile suite missiles, causing them to launch.

As Alexander drew near the large white ship, he noted targeting RADAR starting to lock onto him, he pushed the throttle fully open, and was knocked back into his seat, he rotated the Typhoon 90 degrees so that he'd pass the bridge, and have a good look inside, as he shot passed, he noted white uniforms, but not much else, and that was when he heard soft, sexy female voice he had programmed in for the computer started to repeat one word over and over "Missile!"

He started to look around as fast as he could, as he looked behind him, he noticed them, well 6 to be exact, red tipped darts flying after him, instinctively he released chaff and flairs well putting himself into a high-G turn.

Five of the missiles went for the flairs, well the last one tried to fallow him through the tight turn, but was too much for missile, as it broke apart under the stress, and exploded, harmlessly.

He grunted as he brought himself around to face the ship again, and flicked the master-arm switch, and brought his targeting systems online, once he had a solid tone, his finger hovered over the button to lose a Harpoon Mk VIII anti-shipping missile, should that missile hit home, it would blow that ship in two. _But wait, what if that was an accident, what if they didn't mean to shoot at me…. I'll blow past them again, if they shoot a second time, they are space dust._ He thought to himself, as me kept his finger over the trigger.

Murrue spun in her chair to glair at her X.O. "Ensign Badgiruel, what are you doing?!"

"Captain, Missile lock detected from the unknown!" barked out Petty Officer 2ed class Pal.

Everyone on the bridge held their breath, as the unknown craft blew passed them again, with out firing, then looped around, and flew off again.

Once it had flown off, they all let out their breath, though it had only been a second, most of them, would've sworn it felt like an hour.

Alexander flew passed the ship a second time, then a third, convinced it wasn't actually trying to shot him, he moved on to the little engagement that was going on between the white ship, and the other two.

As he neared the area, he saw a bright flash, heading his way, he stood his fighter up, sending it in a vertical plain, just in time, as yellow energy beams, impacted on the underside of the Typhoon, being absorbed by the pin-point barrier system, that was standard equipment on all U.N. Spacy VF's since the late 2040's, though the computer did flash the master alarm briefly, as the barrier system was brought down by that one shot. _Grate, now I've got a full minute before it can take another hit, so now, I've just got my armour plating left…._

That thought though, was cut short, as a orange thing, that was the only way he could describe it, flew passed him, and then became five orange things, to shoot at for a lack of a better term, he'd call a destroid, non-transformable mecha, it had two large guns, he watched as it let fly another yellow beam salvo, at him, again, A_lright, once I'll chop up-to not knowing what is going on, but twice, it's on now buddy!_

Alexander brought his Typhoon around, in it's own body length, his vision blurred as he did that, even with inertial compensation the force of the turn was still very hard on his body, at the same time, he selected his Medium Range High Manoeuvrability missiles, he locked, the said on to the Tac-net, that should be there "Jolly Roger One, Fox two!"

He couldn't help but grin, this would be an easy kill.

The Buster spun to fire on the unknown mobile armour, that just fired a pair of missiles at him, and he missed?

He couldn't get over himself, the missiles actually got out of the line of fire, he was rattled around in the cockpit, as both missiles hit home, doing as he knew no damage would be done, still he was rattled, by the impact.

Alexander's smile turned into a hanging open jaw, he had never in his 10 years of flying, seen anything shrug off two missile hits like that, there wasn't even a mark on the unit, nothing.

He came around again, this time, he let fly a burst from his gun-pod, the rounds struck the unit, again nothing!

Wait, something did happen, it's colour changed, it was now a dull grey, he came around again and fired again, this time, he hit the unit in it's left arm, just above the elbow, and it was severed clean off, Alexander couldn't help but give a wolfish grin, as he came around again, for what would be his first kill of the day, but it would seem that fate would be against him, as three of the units started to flee towards the two ships he hadn't gone to see yet.

Not put off by this turn of events, he continued to close on his pray, when those ships opened fire on him, he dodged the green beams, but was left with no choice but to turn from the battle.

Alexander gave a bit of a growl as he turned away from the ships, when he heard over his radio "Did you try this frequency yet?"

The voice was that of a young woman, fallowed closely by that of a man "No, not yet, hey you, in the strange mobile armour, do you read us?"

Alexander blinked a couple of times, before responding "This is Lt. Commander Alexander Kross, Call sign Reaper, requesting ID challenge."

Murrue sat bolt upright in her chair, and looked at the speaker, in shock, that was 'his' voice, but he was dead, wasn't he?

Ensign Badgiruel, took over the headset, and spoke into it, "This is Ensign Badgiruel, of the Earth Forces Carrier Arc-Angel, please state the unit you are attached too."

Everyone on the bridge watched her, as her eyes went wide, then narrowed, before speaking "I've never heard of such a unit, please state that again, in case something was lost in transmission."

A few more moments passed, before she pulled off the headset, then spoke "Captain, he is requesting landing clearance, what should I tell him?"

It took a few moments for it to sink into Murrue, could this all be a dream, no it couldn't be, if it was, it'd be more like some sick joke, she slowly nodded her head, to give clearance, for this person to land on the ship.

Once he'd gotten his clearance to land, he brought himself into the return path, and watched as the ship opened up, one of it's massive leg type attachments, he lowered his landing gear, and slowed to what he thought would be the right speed for landing, as he neared the touch down point he heard over his communication system, "You are coming in to fast, slow down, or you will hit the wall!"

Alexander through his engines into reverse, to slow down, to a near crawl, as he hit the path way he taxied the Typhoon, to a spot that it'd be safe in.

Once he was in the hanger, he found an empty space, and shut down the systems, opened the cockpit, and went to swing himself out of the cockpit, as he did so, he was shocked, he was floating!

Petty Officer 1st class Murdoch, felt something akin to amusement, as he watched this pilot move around like he didn't know what to do in micro gravity, or at least he wasn't used to being in it.

On the other side of the hanger Lt. La Flaga watched as the pilot of the white, black and yellow mobile armour, floated as if he didn't know what to do, he shot himself up, to grab the man's hand, and pull him down.

Alexander reached for the hand of this person in a pinky purple and grey flight suite reached for him, once he caught it, he spoke over his built in loud speaker, "Thanks for the save, why isn't the gravity turned on?"

All Lt. La Flaga could do was blink, gravity on a ship? Once they were back on the flight deck, he watched as the other pilot, bounced over to his craft, and grabbed a few things from it, before asking again "What way to the lockers? I need to change before talking to the captain of the ship."

Lt. La Flaga, motioned for him to fallow him, once they were in the locker room, getting changed, he said "I'm Lt. Mu La Flaga, The Hawk of Endymion. And you are?"

Alexander had just gotten his pants done up, then extended a hand, to the man, well saying "I'm Lt. Commander Alexander Kross, call sign Reaper. Once I'm done here, can you take me to the Ship's Captain?"

Mu shook the man's hand, and gave a nod, that he'd take him to see the Captain.

Murrue and Natarle sat in the briefing room, waiting for Mu, and this Lt. Commander Kross. As they sat, Natarle noticed the look on her Captain's face, was one of wonderment as well as apprehension, when the door came open, and Mu walked in, fallowed by a man in a black and white uniform, with copper coloured hair, and green eyes, even Natarle found herself with a bit of a pink huge to her cheeks.

Murrue, was floored, it was Alexander, her Alexander, but his stance, and his eyes held something different; this couldn't be her Alexander, not with such a predatory look in his eyes.

Alexander Kross, stood in the room, looking over the rank markings he could see near the neck lines of their uniforms, and he noticed, no-one here, except for him, held a rank higher then Lt. That was when it happened, his eyes, moved up, from the neck of one of the female officers, and for a moment, his heart leapt, before he reminded himself she dumped him, besides, he knew he wasn't in his reality, he had become one of those un-lucky bastards that got lost in a hyper-space fold, that one in a million chance….

She saw it in his eyes, or did she, it was only there for a second, longing then pain, a lot of pain, before it was hidden behind that predatory look again, she stood up, and spoke "I'm Lt. Murrue Ramius, acting Captain of the Arc-Angel, a pleasure to meet you." There was so much more she wanted to say, at least she would've if it hadn't been for the two other people in the room, and probably would've made a fool out of herself too.

Alexander saluted her, it looked like her, sounded like her, but she didn't hold herself like she did, but it rattled him, none the less, "Lt. Command Alexander Kross," he then placed a copy of his docket on the table, "In there you'll find all my information, and this is going to be a long, long talk, for both of us."

Murrue picked up the file, and begun to read it,

Name: Kross, Alexander James

**Age: 26**

**Sex: male**

**Height: 188cm**

**Weight: 90kg**

**Blood Type: AB**

Rank: Lt. Commander

She stopped reading at that point, everything so far, had matched 'him', and she looked at Alexander, well taking a seat, and then gestured for him to take a seat as well, "I have no doubt that is so, if you don't mind may I ask you, about your craft? I've never seen a mobile armour like it before…."

Alexander sighed inside, she was so calm and collected, just like 'her', he took a seat, placed his cap on the table, and begun a very long speech, "I don't know what a mobile armour is, but what I fly is called a Veritech Fighter, a VF-27S Typhoon to be exact. A Veritech fighter is a transformable fighter, which has three modes. Jet, Soldier a humanoid type configuration and a hybrid called Gear-walk, jet configuration has the greatest speed, manoeuvrability, and weapons payload of all three modes. At the other end of the spectrum Soldier has the slowest speed, least manoeuvrability, and the lowest payload, how ever, it is the most versatile of all three modes, then comes Gear-walk, a hybrid of the two, has most of the advantages of all the modes, but also most of the flaws too. As I no doubt showed today, I favour Jet mode, out of all three. Now I've got a question for you, why did you launch missiles at me?"

Natarle found herself blushing, before she spoke up, "That was an accident, my hand landed on the launch button, when you flew past the bridge…"

"Thought so, okay, on to the next part…" he gave them a brief run-down of the last 180 years of U.N. Spacy, as well as the chance that every jump made can send them to another place, time or reality, usually taking away a way to get home, and that is why, they take with them, a copy of the personal file, as well as data on their craft. Well they filled him in, on what has happened on earth since the late 1990's.

"… So the question is now, what happens now? I've got to pick a side, speaking I genetically should go with what was it again, ZAFT? Since I'm genetically enhanced to be a better pilot, but hey, they shot at me 3 times, you guys only shot at me once. So for picking a side, I think I'd rather stay here. But then that leads to all kinds of issues, considering the secrets locked up in my Typhoon…" asked Alexander, he had undone his jacket, well sipping on a bottle of water.

Murrue dismissed Mu and Natarle, before trying to come up with an idea, no matter what she said, she'd get a lecture from one of them, and in privet, and she could handle that, not in front of an unknown element.

Once she heard the door close, she floated over to Alexander, she wanted to reach for him, before she could he spoke, "So, what happened to me, at least the me, of this reality? Drop the act, I saw the look on your face when I wal… floated into the room, something happened."

She was taken back, by the roughness of his words, and the sharpness of his tongue, "You, died, just over six months ago, I got the letter, and I cried over it, for months, on some nights I still do…" her words were so soft, so quite, he almost missed hearing them, "What about me, where you are from, did we even know each other?"

He looked over his shoulder, and she saw it again, the pain in those eyes, before it was covered up again, in what could only have come to him, in all those years of combat flying, "Yea, we did… At least I thought I knew you." He scolded himself, he didn't have to be so harsh with her, she wasn't 'her', at least mentally, "Look, I don't mean to be so harsh, it's just hard to keep in mind that you are not the same person, that sent me back that ring, and telling me, that you thought it'd be better if we saw other people, then having that guy walk into the video mail, and kiss you… And you know what was the worst part about it; we were only posted a 20-minuet hyperspace fold apart. And before you ask, you dumped me, only six months ago, so the pain is still a little fresh, but I'll do my best, to try and keep it under control, you don't deserve me acting out." By this point he had put his back to her, and he was looking out the window, still able to see her, standing there just behind him, she seemed to be clutching something under her jacket, well looking at his back.

And that was when he saw it, the tears starting to form in her eyes, it tugged at his heart like it always did, and he mentally kicked himself again, for what he was about to say, "If it's going to be too hard on you, I'll leave, so that you can try and get through this messed up situation you are in, because lets face it, you are not ready to be a Captain," that did it, the first tear started to float away from her eyes, "but that's not to say, that you won't make a good one…" the rest of his words fell on deaf ears, since she was so lost in her thoughts _I find him again, and he wants to leave me again? Why does the world like to torment me like this?_

Her thoughts came to an end, as she felts some arms around her waist, and a familiar scent in her nose, she closed her eyes, and let this one moment bring her happiness, before she asked, "Why are you holding me?"

"If there is one thing I hate seeing, it's you crying, and I figured, if this always managed to cheer 'her' up, stands to reason, it'd work here too." Came a soft, almost caring tone from Alexander, before he let her go.

She smiled a little, "Thank you, Commander Kross, I appreciate the hug, after all that's happened in the last day, I really needed it. As to your question earlier I'd like to keep you on-board the Arc-Angel, as more combat pilots, and machines will be more helpful, I can't let you go into Artemis, since they would see that your craft isn't something that should exist, and they might want to take it…." He pressed a finger to her lips, to make her stop talking.

"I'll just fly a long range Combat Air Patrol, say, four hours long? Would that give you enough time to load up on supplies?" he asked, his tone almost playful, and his eyes showed an almost happy look to them.

"It should be enough, if everything goes smoothly, but if not, you might have a long time to wait…." This time she had turned away, from Alexander, the more she looked at him, the more she wanted to feel his touch, she knew she craved her Alexander, but this one could due in his place, if he didn't have such a predatory stance and look about him most of the time.

After several hours, Alexander had his gear in a room, and was back down in the flight deck, helping the techs see to his Typhoon.

Petty Officer 1st class Murdoch, found himself impressed with the manual for this craft, he called over to it's pilot, whom was half buried in one of the engines, "Hey kid, this thing seems easy to maintain, and the ammo for the… " He flipped through the pages again, "Gun-pod seems easy to make, just takes steel, and some time in a machine shop, but I've never seen rail-guns with these kind of specs…"

Alexander smirked to himself, here the rail-guns were more about energy fields, rather then brut speed, of a light weight projectile, "It's more about having something to create a magnetic field for the under slung particle beam, the spinning of the gatling-rail gun, makes the mag-field for containing the charged particles for the particle cannon. Well the other two hull-mounted particle cannons are drawing there mag-field from the main power-cells of the fighter, that's why they can only be used in Jet or gear-walk modes, since the linkage for them, changes place, when the Typhoon goes into soldier modes."

"Well no-wonder you took down the phase shift armour with it, it's got a really impressive rate of fire…" Murdoch said, as he put down the manual, and begun assisting in the removal of the missile from the main missile bay found in the belly of the Typhoon, "So what's are these really big missiles, you know, the four."

"Those are the Harpoon Mk. VIII, they get used for anti-shipping work. You read up on the pin-point barrier system right?" Alexander didn't really wait for a response, "Well what that missile has one of those systems on-board, so it makes has one of those barriers up front as it flies in at a ship, uses it to bust through the hull, then blow up, inside the ship. I've sunk a battle ship with those before, spilt the bitch in two with one missile to mid-ships."

Once the external missiles had been removed, and placed in storage, Alexander went off on his patrol, to stay out of Artemis.

Four hours came and went, with no word from the Arc-Angel, Alexander kept flying about the area, eventually he just cut his engines, and powered down all but life-support, and drifted in space, looking out at the stars, he was alone with his thoughts, and that he found more unsettling then most times.

_God, I was such an ass to her, she didn't do anything wrong, she didn't do anything to hurt me, if anything I'm being the jerk, by treating her affectionately then, the next moment pushing her away…_his thoughts were broken when his proximity alarm went off, letting him know about a craft that was approaching with in 50km of him, he watches on the RADAR as the one craft, is approached by a pair of craft, then they left his passive RADAR range, and he thought nothing more of it, but something about it, just nagged at him, giving into his boredom, he adjusted his drift course to fallow along, with out give away his position.

As he closed the distance, he found that he had to set the computer to auto-avoidance, to keep power levels low, well he watched, a silver and green ship, be boarded, by a small craft from some craft that measured about 130m give or take and a brownish-grey in colour. After what seemed like an hour, the brownish-grey ones opened fire on the silver one. The Silver ship, wasn't firing back, was it un-armed?

Alexander had done many things in his time, with U.N. Spacy, but attacking an un-armed transport wasn't one of them, he powered up his combat systems, setting everything active, he now gave his position away, but he charged forth into battle, he as the range counted down, he charged the two hull-mounted particle cannons, once the range was set, he fired.

The two beams of bright blue, slammed into the side of one of the two Brownish-grey ships, the sides buckled under the hit, they whole side of the ship was exposed to space, but now, his side has been declared, and the other ship started to launch small craft to try and fight him…

Alexander came around again, this time, his shots hit the bridge of the damaged ship, and the craft crumpled, before it exploded in a bright ball of light.

In the instant that he looked to watch the ship blow apart, three small pink ships attacked, Alexander caught it out of the corner of his eye, and shifted his Typhoon into it's soldier configuration, and brought the left arm around to block the incoming shots, he felt the Typhoon shutter, as the three rounds hit the barrier, fallowed by the master alarm telling him that it had come down again, but it had done it's job, saved him and the Typhoon, he spun up it gatling-rail gun, and let it create the magnetic charge he needed, once the charge reached what he wanted, he moved the shield out of the way, and stuck the gun pod out, it was almost against the hull of one of the three pink ships, as the particle beam discharged, ripping the small ship to peaces, with that, he shifted back to the jet configuration, and gave chase to the two remaining craft, he cut the second one down, with a blast from the Particle cannons, well the third one, tried to get above him, in a climb.

The pilot of the moebius unit, looked behind him, to see that white, black and yellow mobile armour still on him, the last thing he saw, was a short flash of blue-white light, from under the main body of the craft, before the 50mm spikes of steel ran through him and his craft.

Having seen what was a weakness in these Brownish-grey ships, Alexander came around again, and struck the bridge, with his particle cannons, and it too, crumpled from the hit, and exploded in a bright ball of light, he turned his attention to the silver craft, as it limped away, but his attention was brought back to where he needed to be, when the Arc-Angel appeared with in his active RADAR range.

He turned to head for, as he'd come to call it, 'the barn' it was a term that had been used to reference a carrier for longer then her knew. As he approached he kept his speed up, again he got that young woman's voice telling him to slow down.

This time, he hit the button that was labelled 'G', the Typhoon shuttered a little, well Alexander put it into a roll, as the legs swung down into position, the tails folded back on the arms to look a little bit like bracers, well the arms, one holding the gun-pod, slipped out under the wings, he could see it, the air-lock door, it was close, he pushed the throttle fully forward, to bring the Typhoon to a halt, just before the door.

Once the door opened, he walked in, in that awkward walk of the hybrid configuration, is prone too, it drew some strange looks, as he neared the mecha scaffolding, he hit the 'S' button and it shifted to it's soldier mode, and walked with much grater ease, Alexander turned it so that he could steep backwards into the scaffolding, once he felt the tell-tail impact, he powered down the systems, and opened the cockpit, to let himself float down to the deck.

Alexander saluted to the crew, as he bounced off the deck, then onto the locker rooms, there he met up with the two other pilots on board, they seemed to be in a discussion, about the morality of what was going on.

"We're not killers, Kira." Said Mu, he seemed to be losing his cool a little.

"I know, but, I don't want to have to kill!" the brown haired boy yelled back.

Alexander sighed, then floated over, "Kid, I know we've not been introduced yet, but take my words here, with a lot of weight, because this is coming from someone who's had to do this job for a long time. We are not killers, we are soldiers, and sometimes we have to shoot people, because if we don't shoot first, they will shoot us, I don't mean to be callous about this, but how long have you been a pilot?"

Kira blinked a couple of times, before responding, "Just over two days, but it feels like it's been two years already."

Alexander was taken back, only two days for this kid, no wonder he'd broken down like this, he changed his stance from being somewhat aggressive, to trying an understanding, maybe even a mentoring stance with the boy, "Two days, I guess you must be the pilot of the, what was it called, Strike? And you are here protecting people that are your friends right?" the boy nodded, "Well, if you don't fight, that just leaves myself and Lt. La Flaga to defend this ship, and we can't do it on our own, you help us, get through this, and I'll do everything I can to help you, get through this. It can't be easy for you, I understand that you've had no formal training, and as much as officers like myself or Mu here might not think about it, that training helps us, not to think that we are shooting to kill, because we know, if we don't pull that trigger first, they will. Neither of us wants to kill, but we don't have a choice, and neither do the guys and girls shooting at us. Take it as some sick cosmic joke, that people that should be able to get along with one another are forced to fight each other."

With that Alexander went to change, and give a de-briefing to the Captain, of what went on in the belt of debris.

Kira watched him go, in some strange way, his words helped.

Alexander came to the Captain's cabin; he knocked twice, once he heard her soft voice "Enter." He smiled to himself; it brought back some memories of happier times for him.

Once the door slid shut behind him, he saw the look of worried on her face again, before she hid it, under a practiced expression of calm, what he was going to say, could wait, rather he asked, "What happened?"

_Could he read my thoughts? Or could he read me like a book?_ She thought to herself, before answering, "We were unable to re-supply at Artemis, we came under attack, and were forced to leave, after taking the ship back… We're running out of water, and other consumables."

She was trying so hard, to be a good officer, a good leader, Alexander could read it on her, like she was an open book, but she just didn't know what to do, he floated over to the wall, beside the window she was looking out of, and he told her about the engagement, he was in, he saw her eyes narrow when he told her about the drake class ships, as he was informed they were, firing on the un-armed transport.

"You did the right thing, helping them out, it bothers me, a little, to hear that forces from my own side, are doing things like that…" she had started, before Alexander cut her off with, "And that was when I saw it, a lake, at least 8km in diameter, of solid Ice, that would solve one problem at least, let me show you on the map."

He floated over to her terminal and brought up the map, and highlighted the area, and she brought her right hand to her mouth, well gasping _He can't be serious! That's the remains of Junius Seven, but maybe he's on to something…._

"What? Did I do something wrong?" he asked, hearing her reaction, to what he found.

"N…No, you didn't it's just that this what is left of Junius Seven, I told you about that, the Bloody Valentine raid…" she trailed off, seeing him nod, in understanding, before speaking, "Not to be a vulture, but they the sprits of the dead, don't need the water, or some of the other consumables we might be able to get, there. I'd just recommend we don't take personal effects. Some times we have to do, less then noble things, to stay alive. Just part of the job, anyways, think it over, you've got my support, no matter what you pick."

With that, he floated off, and out of her cabin. She started to hatch a plan to keep everyone on this ship alive…

Alexander watched as these small craft moved about picking up peaces of ice, and moving them back to the ship, he boosted over to one, in his soldier configuration, and said over the radio, "hey you're Tolle right?"

The boy stammered to answer, "Yes, that's Me." he'd seen Alexander in the corridors over the last couple of days, and found his calm reassuring.

"Alright, and you're with that girl running the communications for the fighters, and the ship right_? _Miriallia is her name?" Alexander asked thumbing the switch to his pulse lasers, which are mounted just to the sides of the mono visor that covers the main cameras, when the boy told him that was a yes, he started cutting out of the Ice:

Tolle

Miriallia

He then cut around it, picked up the piece of ice, then handed it to Tolle in that small utility craft, before speaking, "Take off, and show this to her, I'll get this sheet back to the barn."

Alexander watched him go, he laughed to himself, to be that young again, and that in-love, he picked up the peace of ice, and started to move through what was once a town, when he saw it, sitting in a shop window, a simple teddy bear, with a little red bow around it's neck, it's white fur made him smirk.

He stopped heading back, to grab the bear, very delicately, so not to disturb anything else, he brought it, up to his cockpit, and got it inside, before heading back to the ship.

Once on board he heard Ensign Badgiruel, berating the kid again, "You really do have a talent for brining things back, that really should be left behind don't you."

He placed the Typhoon in it's dock, as the door to the pod opened, to have a pink haired girl come floating out of it, that seemed to draw everyone's attention to her.

Alexander just shrugged it off, to leave for the showers, and get some sleep, before paying the Captain a little visit.

Again, he stood out side her door, knocked twice, then came her soft voice, telling him to enter, as he walked in, she was again looking out the window, he thought to himself, _Every time I see her like that, it's just like the first time I met 'her' on Eden five…_

He smiled at that thought, and then held out the bear, well saying, "For you, you try so hard, and do so well, with such little. I admire that."

His voice was so warm, and gentle to her, it was the first time she had heard him speak like that to her, it took her back to a happier time, she turned to see the bear in his hands, she smiled, and couldn't help but blush a little, "Thank you Commander, but are you sure that this is appropriate?"

His head tilted a little to the left, and the left side of his face curled up into a little smirk, "Well if you don't want it, I'm sure I can find a young woman on-board that would like a teddy bear… But I really do admire the way; you are dealing with these hardships. You are doing so much better then I would be in your place, I'm so used to having the resources of an entire fleet to draw on." He placed the bear on her desk, before flopping down on her couch, and continuing, "Besides, I was a real jerk when we first met, I let my self be baited by my feelings, rather then my brain. As a pilot, it's hard not to go with your gut reactions, sometimes it's all that makes the difference between life and death."

She smiled, and took the bear, it was so soft, and inviting, she sat beside him, and spoke "I know, I'm finding it hard, to look at you, and not see they you I knew, I know he is gone, but it's times like this, when I see you being sweet, and sensitive, or hearing what you said to Kira to try and get him to understand, as well as Tolle and Miriallia, they both appreciated it. I think out of everything that has happened, pressing them into service has been one of the worst, it's been so hard on those kids…" she was looking down into the bear's head, when he spoke.

"I was there age, when I shot down my first enemy, I remember seeing the look on their face, through the gun camera, just as the first round struck the cockpit, and it tore them apart. You never forget the first time; it's how you deal with it, that's important. Kira needs some one to guide him through this; I'm trying to be a mentor for him, having been in his place, but not having been there. Where I'm from, all pilots are enhanced, we usually burn out, in about 15 years, forcing us to become ship board Captains, since we can't keep up, with the new kids anymore. But we don't make a point of letting the enhancements separate us from everyone else, when it comes down to it, we are all still human." He stood and walked over to the drink dispenser in her cabin, and took out two waters, handing one to her, before walking back over to the window.

"Really? You don't see the difference between enhanced people and those that aren't?" she knew she was asking a stupid question, but she could see him smile, it was warm and inviting to her, "I know stupid question right?

"Don't worry about it, I can understand your surprise, but we've had bigger issues to deal with, like space aliens trying, and nearly seceding, in wiping out the human race, a few different times, things like that, seem to bring people together, when there is a threat to everyone, it just makes things easer to accept the smaller things. And don't let it get around, that I'm sometimes a nice guy, it'd ruin my image." He smirked at the last bit, causing her to laugh.

"Alexander, I can call you that right?" she hesitated, but sighed inwardly, when he nodded that she could, "I have a feeling things are going to get a lot worse, soon, I mean the 8th fleet will be here soon, but we've got a V.I.P. on board now, that girl with the pink hair, Lacus Clyne, she's the daughter of the leader of the PLANT Siegel Clyne..."

He whistled, before speaking, "Well that is a bit of a problem, and when we link up, with the fleet, they might want to use her as a bargaining chip."

She blinked a couple of times, before speaking, "So part of those enhancements, did they make it, so you could read people's minds? Oops! Sorry!" she finished with a blush coming to her cheeks, well her hands shot up to her mouth.

She was worried did she offend him? She watched his shoulders start to roll, and his head fall, he was laughing? She hadn't heard him laugh, it was low and quite, but he was.

"So, if we are going to start being so informal, can I start calling you Murrue, at least in privet? I understand the need to keep some distance between you and your officers out in public. And no, you didn't offend me, I thought it was cute, 'she' used to accuse me of mind reading all the time." He at this point had turned to face her, his green eyes showing there amusement, at her, not even trying to be hidden.

She smiled at him, every time he came to her cabin, she felt a little closer to him, each time a new level to him was shown, and she saw a little more of 'him' in this Alexander Kross, she scolded herself, for looking for it, thinking it could only end in heart ache, but she felt like being a little care free, when she spoke, "Of course you can, Alexander, I was thinking, once we meet up with the 8th fleet…" her words were cut short, by Miriallia, calling for her to come to the bridge. She sighed, _maybe later._ She thought, as she straitened her uniform, and left for the bridge.

They both entered the bridge at the same time, and watched the events un-fold, the advanced fleet was cut down, before them, and that pink haired girl was used as a bargaining chip, once things had settled down, Alexander confronted Natarle out in the corridors, "What the hell is wrong with you?" he yelled at her, grabbing her by the lapels of her jacket, and spinning her to face him, "Using a civilian like a shield, it makes me wonder just how many officers, in this earth alliance force, actually have morals!"

Her violet eyes glared back at him with the same fire, they show to her Captain, "And just who the hell do you think you are, treating me like this? You, who aren't even part of our forces, just some tag-along, whom we found, and let hitch a ride with us… I did what I did, to save this ship, I had no intention of letting that girl come to any harm, she's far too valuable to high command, as a way to bring this war to a close, quickly."

He let go of her jacket, with a bit of a push, letting her float into the wall, before he headed off down the corridor.

As he floated down the halls, he started to hatch a plan, _I'm not part of their forces, so anything if I do, they can't do anything about it, other then not letting him land again, but lets face it, if this is the kind of people they are, then I'm not so sure I want to be here._

A boy with brown hair, wearing a blue jacket as he spoke "Commander Kross, can I ask you something", stopped him?

Alexander looked at the boy, searched his mind for the kids name, "Sure Kira, what's on your mind? And you can call me Alexander, if it makes you feel a little better, I'm not actually part of the Earth Forces…. Before you ask, I'll tell you about it some time, it's just a really long, and complicated story."

Kira's expression softened, before he spoke, "I've got a friend on the other side, he's a very good friend of mine, he pilots the red mobile suite, the Aegis…" Kira leaned against the wall, looking a little unsure of himself, before he continued, "That girl, Lacus, she's engaged to him, and I don't like seeing here being used as a shield…"

Alexander smirked at this, "Well first off, that's got to be a tough brake for you kid, I saw how taken you were with her, but more importantly, I'm right with you, I hate seeing civilians used as shields, it's cowardly, and un-becoming of military personnel. I was going to do something about it, but knowing a bit more, about what's going on, how about you take her back, and I'll just help, like leaving the doors open, to the lockers for the flight gear?"

Not really waiting to hear the kid's response Alexander headed off to the lockers, to get the flight gear ready for the kid, and the girl, then out to the hanger deck he floated, to wait, for everything to get set into motion.

Having saw his little plan work, a-be-it with some problems, but nothing too major, at least as far as he saw it, till the kid came back, and the two of them were steeping out of the lockers, to see the Captain, Mu La Flaga, and Natarle Badgiruel, standing all looking rather annoyed with something, but it was Murrue that spoke, "Kira, what you did was very serious, you have to come with us."

Kira, looked to Alexander, whom sighed, before steeping forward, placing his hands together, with his palms up, "It was my idea to give the girl back, I talked the kid into doing the exchange, since that girl seemed most comfortable around him, it made the most sense, so drag me off."

Murrue sighed, this wasn't a turn of events she had planned on, she had intended on making a show of a trial to Kira, to make him understand that what he did placed the entire ship in danger, but to see that 'he' had a hand in it, made it harder, _He's an officer, he should know better then to do something stupid like this!_ "Alright, take them both." Was all she could say.

So that was Chapter one, not bad, for a start, some 22 pages, give or take, and hey, if you made it this far, thanks for reading, and I'd appreciate a review or two.

I'll write more and post more, as time allows.


	2. Chapter 2

Feathers and Bones Feathers and Bones

Chapter two: All that Glitters

A/N: Well just as a bit of heads up, I'm not planning on making the Typhoon on par with the G.U.N.D.A.M.S. doing something like that, would just be silly, but it's going to fall in that middle ground between the X numbers and the mass production units.

Also, the Typhoon is going to struggle if forced into close combat, it's not really designed for it, it relies more on ranged combat, ideally some where between 1 km and 50 km, since that is where all of it's weapons are meant to be used.

As for the Pin-point barrier system, what it is, well the fighter carried version, is an energy barrier that is able to absorb immense damage, but only take a couple of hits, 1 – 3 depending on the strength of the hit. The version of it, mounted on the Harpoon Mk. VIII is more or less an offensive application of the barrier, since it is used, to punch through the armour and hull of a ship, before failing, letting the impact trigger cause the missile to explode it's 1000 kg warhead inside the ship, for maximum damage. For more information on modern missiles like this, look up the Harpoon or Exocet missiles.

The GU-27, the gun pod of the Typhoon, the upper portion of the gun, is where the gatling-rail gun is mounted, the 50mm spikes, are launched from an 8 barrelled rotating system that obtains a rate of fire of 5,000 rounds / minuet or roughly 83 rounds per second. So if you were wondering why it brought down the Phase shift armour, it hit about 70-ish times in that short one second burst.

On with the show!

* * *

She watched as he just sat there, during the mock trial for Kira, he didn't say a word, just sat there, he knew his turn was coming, all she could think of as he sat there was, _That arrogant… look at him, he knows what's going on, I bet he has some ace up his sleeve, I sure wouldn't put it passed him…_

"Captain? What is your verdict?" asked Natarle, she seemed to be growing impatient.

Murrue sighed, as she looked about the cabin, Lt. La Flaga seemed to be wanting to know what was in for his 'client', whom was looking worried, she felt a stab of guilt over this, she really didn't want to be so hard on him, after everything he's done, but she has no choice, "Based on these charges, Mr. Yamato, the penalty is death…" she felt even guiltier when she saw his purple-y blue eyes go wide with shock, "How ever, since you are not actually part of the military, the penalty, is suspended, but I'm going to have to put you in the brig for a little wile, just so that you understand how serious what you did is."

The boy, sighed in relief, well the man sitting on the couch, with the black and white uniform did nothing but smirk. Murrue dismissed her two other officers, along with the boy, well turning on the man on the couch.

"How could you, an officer…!" she started, before he cut her off, "Look, they way I see it, you've got two options, you can let me go, with nothing but a slap on the wrist, or you can toss me off this ship… But I doubt that you'd be up for the latter option, since that would leave this ship with one less pilot, and fighter." He was smirking again; she could feel it, even if she wasn't facing him.

_That son of a…. No, I'll find out why he things he can get away with this, first._ Were here thoughts, before coming up with her actual question, "And why do you feel that what you did was justified?" this time, she turned to face him, trying not to look into his jade green eyes.

"Simple, I'm not going to back a force, that has shot at un-armed ships, and is willing to use civilians as shields. Now I'm not saying that U.N. Spacy has been any better in the past, I know it hasn't, but we at least have a choice when it comes to fallowing unlawful orders. And sorry, but using that girl as a shield is pretty damn unlawful, If you ask Me." He was standing by this point, just a few inches from her face, again he was smirking, and she was finding it hard, to stay angry with him.

"Jerk. You're right, but you are still a jerk, and that's playing dirty by the way, I didn't authorize using that girl as a shield… now how about you tell me why you got Kira involved, rather then that excuse you gave in the hall way." She felt a smile tugging at the sides of her mouth, she couldn't help it, every time she caught him smiling, and she found it contagious.

"Well I didn't lie, if that's what you were thinking, I just omitted some details…" he trailed off, looking over to the window, "like?" she asked, her left eyebrow arched, as she looked out the window as well.

"The kid, Kira, he's best-friend is flying that red machine, the Aegis, he's engaged to that girl Kira saved. So rather then having them shooting at each other for once, why not let him do something nice for his friend? Well, that's what I thought, once he told me about the situation." He had floated over to the window, after grabbing water, "Just don't tell him you know, alright, I said I'd keep that quite, he's really torn up, about having to fight his friend." He finished, taking sip.

She sighed, taking her own water, and collecting her thoughts, _I knew he had something up his sleeve, I just didn't expect this._ "That explains a lot actually, why the Strike hasn't been really fighting the Aegis, like it has against the other three. Alright, you are going to get your slap on the wrist, your confined to quarters till we link up with the 8th fleet, then I figure, there is going to be a lot of questions asked, now get out of here, and get some sleep alright? You're looking tired."

She couldn't help but sigh, as he left her cabin, he was so calm and cool, entirely in control of what went on, right from the get-go, he played it, just how he wanted it to go. It bothered her, but made her feel relaxed at the same time.

He was standing in his room, with a towel around his waist, looking at the pictures that he had on the mirror, they were all the ones from his old locker, save for one, he smiled, as he touched the one, of him and his squadron, from the U.N.S. Victoria, CVS-702. _Home._ He thought as he looked at it, 10 years on that ship, moving up from the VAF-102 Diamondbacks, to the VAF-113 Stingers, and finally getting his own squadron, VAF-103 the Jolly Rogers, he found it nice, to have a squadron under his command, with such a long, and illustrious history, going back, all the way to the second world war, on old Terra.

He was pulled from his thoughts, by a gentle knocking at his door, "Enter." He barked, a little more then he should've, but what was done was done.

The door slid open, and a tall man with blond hair, with this highest rank, that Alexander had seen to date, on his uniform, was flanked to the left by Murrue, he turned to face them, his circular dog tags, with the red and white diamond in the middle showing proudly against his tanned well defined chest. "And to what do I owe, the pleaser?" he asked, looking at them, with his head tilted off to his right side.

The two of the walked into his room, as the door slid shut, the man, removed his cap, before speaking, "So you are the one, that belongs to that strange mobile armour on the flight deck, at least that is what captain Ramius tells me, she also says you are not from here, at least not earth or the PLANT."

Murrue looked at Alexander, her eyes couldn't help but wander, it was the first time she'd seen this version of him, more or less naked, also the first time, she'd see what he'd done with the quarters, she noted some pictures behind him, before she took a seat on his bed. "I told him, what you told me, the Admiral wanted to speak to you, after he saw your Typhoon…." She trailed off, as the Admiral extended his hand to Alexander.

"I'm Rear Admiral Lewis Halberton, a pleasure to meet you, Lt. Commander Kross." Alexander chook the man's hand, not really sure, what to do at this point, "I understand, that what ever it was that brought you too us, may have made it difficult for you to return home, so I have an offer for you, if you are interested." The Admiral continued, after letting go of Alexander's hand "That offer is, to instate you, as an officer of the 8th fleet, of the Earth Forces… And yes, I agree with you, about the incident that happened with those two Drake class ships, needed to be stopped, as well as I don't like the idea of civilians being used as shields."

Alexander drifted off into the bathroom, to grab his uniform pants, before repapering, and speaking, "Look, right now, I've got a couple of objectives, the big one, is get some time, to actually pull all the panels on the Typhoon, to find out, what's wrong with it, because there is no way, I got here, with out something going wrong, and with being stuck in round the clock sorties, not nearly enough ground staff, and me not being an engineer I'm not really that qualified to poking around inside that bird. The second objective is to find a way home, as much as I might not like it, my current assignment from U.N. Spacy is to report to Terra for assignment to a Flight School as an instructor."

Alexander leaned back against the mirror, and folded his arms in front of his chest, he looked to Murrue, then back to this Admiral, whom seemed to be in thought, before responding, "Well it would be easier to have your craft serviced, with our, being the 8th fleet's resources, or for that matter Alaska's, since that is where the Arc-Angel is heading. And if you were one of our officers, we could slip you in easily, into the repair line, since we now have some new machines of our own, we can just claim it was under development as well, so that is why there is…"

Alexander cut him off, "No offence, but not going to happen, right now, she flies, fights, and does alright, the only way, I am letting a non- U.N. Spacy engineer poke around in her, is if I don't have a choice, I know I gave Murrue the data on it, but this craft still has a lot of secrets, that I'm not willing to happily hand over, at this time."

The Admiral smiled, and nodded, "If you did, I would've been worried, none the less, I would like you to continue to protect this ship, till it's safely at Alaska. Now if you will excuse me, I have other places on this ship to be. Have a pleasant day, Lt. Command. Captain." And with that, he left the room.

Murrue stood to leave the room as well, when she felt a hand grab her wrist, she turned to see Alexander, with a bit of a smile on his face, "Congratulations on the promotion, I can read rank after all, I see the extra stripe on your shoulders. I'm going to launch with the Typhoon, something is going on, I can feel it, we've not been under attack, in a wile, so I know that something is going to happen soon."

Murrue smiled, and nodded, "I know, you've got permission to launch, just don't wander too far, in case you need to go planet side, you should be in the Arc-Angel…"

She watched as he finished getting into his uniform, before heading off to the flight gear lockers.

Alexander was tossed back into his seat, as the catapult through him out of the ship, with his after-burners showing off there power, he rocketed past the large blue ship, that was just off to the side, of the Arc-Angel, he did a tight pass, around it's tower, before heading out beyond the fleet, with his RADAR doing a full sweep.

Admiral Halberton, watched with interest as that white, black and yellow craft circled his ship, as if just to give him, a short air-show, before it shot off, into space.

"I wish that boy would've taken us up, on that offer, a craft like that, would've been an interesting study." He spoke, to the man to his left.

Alexander, was just coming back around the fleet, when he saw the flashes of light, that were the tell-tail signs of battle, his RADAR was filling rapidly with targets, everything except for one ship, was showing as non-friendly, he mentally kicked himself for not taking the time, to key in, the profiles of these craft, to tell the difference between not so hostile, and down right hostile.

As he neared the battle, he saw some of the machines that he was told were called GINN's, Alexander locked up two of them, and he let fly 4 short range high manoeuvre missiles. He hoped that these machines were not as well protected, as the X number machines, as the distance closed, the GINN's turned in time, to see the missiles, just before they hit home, their centre bodies erupted in fire and debris.

Alexander grinned, he found his prey now, and set about to attack the remaining GINN's.

He came in at full throttle at this one GINN that was on top of that blue ship, with it's rifle about to open fire on it's bridge, a quick tap of the trigger, and a shower of steel spikes flew at the GINN, striking it in the shoulder.

The GINN turned and used it's boosters, to attack it's new attacker, the pilot licked his lips, some new mobile armour, _this should be easy_, he thought to himself, to his horror though, the white craft changed into a mobile suite, still traveling at him, at a high rate of speed, he dropped his rifle, to pull his sword, and flared his engines to close the gap even faster.

Alexander selected the particle beam, and tapped the trigger, losing that blue-white beam, he watched as it hit the craft in the chest, then passed through it's chest, causing the craft to explode. Satisfied with his kill, Alexander went back to his Jet configuration, and blew passed the bridge of the Admiral's ship.

But this was a battle that they weren't going to win, no matter how hard they pressed the attack. As ships fell, other tried to fall back, to shield the one white and red ship, as it breached the atmosphere, a craft stuck to it's decent, into the planet, even as the ship changed it's course to stay with another craft that belonged to it.

As the Arc-Angel shuttered under it's own weight in the sky of Earth, the crew looked out the bridge windows, to see a craft go shooting past, it's two spheres of blue-white behind it, the craft went some distance passed them, before turning in a steep climb, the air braking over it's wings, well contrails came off the tips of it's wings. And that was when it happened, the armoured glass of the bridge shuttered, as a very audible 'BOOM' passed through the bridge.

Alexander felt, the shutter of joy from his fighter, as it's engines for the first time in their life, bit into the air of Earth. No matter how many times, on how many different planets he flew in, each new planet felt different for his fighter, she seemed to enjoy it, the thrill, the feel of the air over her control surfaces. The craft was semi-smart, it knew enough when it was in space or in an atmosphere, but not much else, at least that's what General Galaxy would say. Though if one asked a pilot of a Typhoon, they would swear, that each one had it's own personality.

He grunted as the strain of the high G turn brought him around and behind the Arc-Angel again, as they neared the surface of the planet, he brought himself into land, and took a deep breath of the sealed air of the ship, before it was changed over, to local.

"What do you mean the kid had a rough re-entry?" Alexander asked Mu, as they were walking the halls of the ship.

"Well we've got no idea how hot it got in the cockpit of the strike… by the way, I heard as well as felt, your little fly-by. I'm a little envious, I've got to wait till the Sky-Graspers are ready, before I can get out there again." Said the tall blond man, just before they separated off for the evening.

In her cabin, Murrue grumbled to herself _Grate, I've been down here now, four hours, and that's the fourth cup of coffee I've spilt on myself!_

Her thoughts were cut short, from the short double knock on her door, she smiled to herself that was his knock, "Enter" she managed to catch herself before she almost sung it out.

He walked in, he looked so pleased with himself, she couldn't help but smile, "Did you know that would happen when you flew passed the bridge that close?"

He stretched and walked further into the room, to stand at the window, smirking to himself even more, before he responded, "Consider that my way of saying 'thanks' for letting me out to play in space today."

"How do you do it? How is it, that you can make this all look so easy? I saw how you shot down those GINN's with what looked like so little effort?" part of herself didn't want the answer, but she needed to know it.

"If you think I make this look easy, it's because I want every one around me, to feel confidant, in what is going on. Me, I'm scared, I've never been to Earth, much less being stuck in a world I don't know much about it, seeing that I've got no-one around I can look to for guidance, because they aren't whom they are to me, at least. Look at me, we've barely known each little under a month, and I'm already talking to you, like you are my confident." He said, looking out over the sand, one hand on the glass. "As for the GINN's, they are in the same class, I guess as my Typhoon, a main line craft, not an experimental, like those X numbers, against them, more then three quarters of my fire-power is wasted, as it won't even scratch them."

It was times like this, which she both enjoyed, and made her nervous, _If he's scared, and just puts up that act to make us all feel better, then things are probably worse, then they look…_ "Alexander, I hadn't thought about that, at least not till you more or less told the Admiral what he could go and do with himself, in a very polite way." She smiled as she thought about the short time she spent in his cabin, "But I wanted to ask you about those pictures, that were on the mirror…"

"The one in the top left corner on the mirror, the ship, you saw in it, that is the Victoria, that ship was my home, since I was 16, right up until I got here. As for the others, they are just shots of me, and the friends; some now long dead that I made there. I'm sure you saw the one that was just off to the centre, well that one, was taken the day I took command of VAF-103 Jolly Rogers." He still hadn't left the window, though his eyes had traveled up, to look at the stars.

She smiled, and walked up behind him, and placed her arms around his chest, and said, "Don't take this the wrong way, but you looked like you could use a hug, you sound kind of home sick…. I think I would be as well."

"All I want right now, is stability in my life, I'm almost at the end of run as a pilot, I've been getting ready to shift into the role as a ships captain, at least there, the amount of time, I've got to worry about getting shot at, is so much less, but the rush I get from the flying all but goes away, granted I'll be able to keep a craft for my personal use, but I won't be able to stray too far, from my ship." He said, so softly, that she almost missed it.

She smiled and put her head against his back, and took in his scent, she was enjoying this, it was bringing back so many happy memories, until he pulled away from her embrace, to look at her and smile, with a bit of a pout she spoke up, "We're going to be heading out, as soon as Kira is good enough to leave sick bay, I'd like you to fly out, and map a route to the sea. We're going to have to go through the Indian ocean, since that'll keep us away from Gibraltar, as well as far from Victoria as possible."

He nodded, "I'll be away then for a couple of days. 'Cause I'm guessing you want a in-depth search, not just a high speed fly through?"

She smiled again, before speaking, "There you go again, reading my mind. Now off with you, I'll see you again, in a couple of days." She watched as he reached for the door control, and spoke again, "And Alexander, please be careful."

"Aren't I always?" he grinned, as he exited the cabin, to take off in his search.

It had been an exhausting several days for Alexander, flying low, to avoid RADAR, and slow to get a good look at the area, though it was mostly sand, sand and more sand. But he mapped it out a few different routes three to be exact, on his flight back, he was almost back he shot over the area where the Arc-Angel should've been to find that it was gone, but the there were signs of battle.

He started to search the area with active RADAR, sweeping left and right, well in his search pattern he spotted two jeeps, heading out into the desert.

The Typhoon got low, and shifted into the high speed cruise mode, it's wings swung down slightly, well the rear tails / rear wings sung up, to fit snugly on the sides of the engines, well the three fins on each engine were forced open, wide as the thrust reached into the after burner range.

Natarle was sitting back, in the Jeep, relaxing, she had managed to meet all of the objectives of her task in the town, had even managed to find the Kid, and that blond girl, they were on there way back to the Arc-Angel. She sighed, this place had it's own kind of beauty, but she could do with out the sand, as it got everywhere. Her head flopped back, against the metal of the jeep, and she thought she saw something in the sky, it was low, and coming in very fast, it kind of looked like the Typhoon, but it was different, the wings were lower on it, then every other time she'd seen it, then it hit her, it was coming in very low, and very fast, "Stop the jeep, and pull off to the side, then get out!" she barked.

Once the jeep had gotten off to the side, and everyone bailed out of it, the fallowing Jeep did the same, just in time as the Typhoon shot passed them, with a trail of sand flying up into the sky behind it, and that was when the Earth Forces personnel covered their ears, the shock-wave created by the Typhoon knocked everyone to the ground, as it breached the speed of sound.

Natarle was the first to push herself back up, she looked at the jeeps, all of the glass, and mirrors had been shattered, she turned her head to see the Typhoon come around again, this time slower, it's wings looked like they normally did, she watched as the legs swung out from under it, as well as it's arms came out of hiding. _That must be that Gerwalk mode he was talking about_. Was her thoughts as it came to rest on the sand, it's nose tipped to the ground, as the cockpit opened.

Alexander exited the cockpit, after shutting down they systems, to walk over to the jeeps, he was sure that they were earth forces, they should be able to tell him where to find the Arc-Angel, as he walked over to them, he noticed that dark haired Lieutenant, _Grate, I'm in for a lecture from that one…_ he thought as he walked up to them.

"Good to see you back, Commander. But maybe next time, use the radio." She had placed her hands on her hips, well glaring at him.

"Now what fun, would that have been? Besides, the kids looked like they needed to play in the sandbox for a little wile anyways, no sense in them getting to go back to the ship all nice and clean… hey, who are these people?" he was getting himself ready to run back to the Typhoon, if things were bad.

"They are allies, freedom fighters of the area. Did your recon go well?" She was still annoyed with him, _How does the Captain put up with his flippant attitude over things like this!_

"Went fine, I've found three routes that'll work. Would've been nice if you all left a note, saying you were going to leave with out me." He smirked; he was enjoying this, getting under her skin.

She clenched her teeth, before telling him, to fallow them back to where the ship was hidden. As the Typhoon flew down the canyon in it's Gerwalk mode, it drew looks from the various freedom fighters in the area that was till it vanished inside of the Arc-Angel.

Powering down the systems, Alexander opened the cockpit, to see the two Sky-Graspers sitting idol their engines howling, and he saw a simulator being set up.

He smirked, and took a copy of the data he had retrieved on his flights, up to the Captain.

"Enter" she spoke, not even looking up from her desk, _I hope he's okay, it's been almost five days since he left…_ were her thoughts, as a familiar form in a black and white uniform walked into the room.

She smiled at him, before standing to greet him, "Good to see that you made it back, I was starting to wonder."

He tossed the memory disk to her, before taking a seat on the couch, and opening his jacket a bit, "Three routes, all different, there would've been more, but I encountered a few patrols out there, but they couldn't attack, what they couldn't catch."

"I'm glad, that you were able to stay safe," she turned slightly pink at her words, as his right eyebrow arched a little, "Th… that is to say, with out you, I... We'd have it more difficult…" she was rambling at this point, well mentally scolding herself. _Stupid, stupid, stupid! Why does he always make it hard to think!_

He smiled at her; he always found it easy to be around her, despite everything that 'she' had done, this Murrue was so much different, so much kinder and gentler. "So, I'm important to you then?" his voice was soft, but his eyes were still covered up, in that predatory look.

She became a little more red, "Silly I know, maybe I'm just projecting what I want to see over you, I don't know. But you have this way, of clouding my judgment, till you showed up, I was able to keep a bit of distance between me and my officers…"

He leaned his head against the wall, smile still on his handsome features, though his eyes were shut, "Sorry," Was all he said, in a soft voice.

She blinked a couple of times, waiting for him to finish what he was going to say, after about a minuet, she walked over to him, looked him over, and smiled, as she slowly and gently put him on his side, on her couch, and placed her coffee stained jacket over him. _He must be tired, I can't imagine he slept well in those few days. I'll let him sleep there, well I look over this data, and do some paper work._

It was early or very late depending on how you looked at it, when he stirred on the couch, the smell of roses about his nose. His eyes shot open, the room was dark, but he knew that this wasn't his cabin, nothing was in the right place for it. He rubbed the sleep from his eyes, over at the far side of the room, with a head of chocolate brown hair, spilled over the desk, was a beautiful woman, fast asleep, in her paper work.

_I must've fallen asleep when we were talking, I think I ruffled her feathers a bit, but she let me sleep, I'll just put her to bed, then get off to my cabin, for the rest of the night._ He thought, as he very quietly, and gently moved her from her desk, then placed her in her bed, tucking the covers around her, she stirred for a moment, he held his breath, and his motion as she settled back into her slumber. _Maybe this world won't be so bad._ He thought as he left her room.

As the door slid shut behind him, he was face to face with that blond girl that was working in the CIC, the two of them stood in silence just looking at one another for a moment, before what could only be called a smirk appeared on her lips.

"So that's why the Captain hasn't been at her best, I didn't think she was with anyone on the ship…" her voice was almost coy about it.

"We're not, I fell asleep on the couch, after I came back from my patrol, that was all." He said, quietly, though she wasn't buying it.

"Well if you call it 'sleeping' that's your call. But I'm late for my shift," she laughed, "get some actual rest now, the officers have a meeting tomorrow." She waved, as she left for the bridge.

He sighed heavily before wondering off to his cabin, and flopping down on his back, to stair at the white ceiling all night.

The days came an went, loading ammo for the various weapons, and maintenance on the ship, as well as the war machines that were found onboard, Alexander had found the little simulator that had been set up, interesting, he watched the young crewmen, all take a turn or two at it, even Mu La Flaga, had taken an interest in watching the results. The girl, with the red shirt, and a slight attitude problem, placed the highest on the score board, that was till Mu climbed in, fallowed by Alexander, whom to his displeasure, didn't do as well as he thought he would. "It's just a silly game.."

"No, you're just not used to the characteristics of the Sky-Grasper, I've seen your Typhoon in action, there is a class difference between the two of them." Was what Mu had said, after seeing the low score by Alexander, "The Sky-Grasper is a multi-role support craft, your beast, is a predator, pure of form, and purpose, and it does it's role. She's probably a wild a ride, am I right?"

"More then you know, but she was built with enhanced pilots in mind, so you'd probably have a hard time, taking some of the turns I can, my body can handle up to 12G's. And there are times, when I nearly black out, or Red out, depending if I'm climbing or diving." Alexander had said, as he re-checked everything in the Typhoon.

The day was set, the stage had been selected, a show down on the hot sand. This battle was one about it's players, striking with well placed timing and traps, and a lot of luck, mostly due to a missed beam weapon, striking some fuel tanks, that cause what should've been a victory for ZAFT into a complete loss. The apex of the battle was the loss of an orange mobile suite, and the loss of it's crew, that broke the back for the ZAFT forces, they with drew from the field, with their tail between their legs.

The Typhoon, shuttered a little, as it landed in the Arc-Angel, Alexander could feel his fighter's displeasure about being in a desert, the sand was getting everywhere, into the panels, the intakes, even the barrels of the weapons. He was looking forward to the Ocean, to see an ocean of water, rather then an ocean of sand.

It had been only a few days since they left the desert, a few minor battles, that had ended with no grate loss, except for one, the last one, a pilot had gone missing, the girl, that had tagged along with them, since the desert, she had gone down some where, close, they had all hoped.

Their search had to be called off, due to the setting of the sun, even Alexander was feeling agitated over this, he had backed Mu, in sending her back to the ship, when her craft became damaged, neither of them, thought to escort her back, and now she was missing.

He hit his wall, with the side of his clenched fist, just as a knock came to his cabin door, "Enter." Her growled, in frustration, at his inability to not think his actions through, he never would've done that, before, so why was he so careless here and now, he wondered.

Murrue, walked into his room, she could see that he was angry, she didn't even have to hear it in his voice, when he told her she could come in, in the month and a bit that they had known each other, she'd let herself feel more for him, then anyone else on the ship, but she had found it funny, neither of them had spoken a word about that night, that he fell asleep on her couch, "She'll be alright till morning, then we can start looking again."

"I was careless, I shouldn't have let her fly off on her own, she even said that her navigation system was damaged, if I hadn't been so preoccupied by that mobile suite, I would've gotten her back here." He said, as his hand slid down the wall, well his head hung low.

"Alex," she paused to see how those words felt, to see if she could use a shortened form of his name, not seeing any objection, she continued, "I was talking to Crewmen Haw, she seems to be under the impression that we are some kind of item…"

He let go of the wall and walked into his bathroom, after running the fingers on his left hand over that picture of him, and one of the squadrons he served in. "I tired to tell her, all that happened was I fell asleep, on your couch, but she didn't believe me."

She heard those words, from the bathroom, and felt both some pride, and some guilt, she had thought that perhaps he had run with it, or at least entertained the idea. She sighed, before speaking, "You know, I wouldn't mind, something like that, maybe if this war wasn't going on, or…." Her words drifted off, as she saw him walk out of the bathroom, and lean against the door, before walking passed her, and out of the room.

She sighed, well thinking, _It feels like we just had our first fight. _She absently hugged herself, well leaning against the wall, she took the time, to actually go and look at those pictures, she saw two that weren't up there yet, one that seemed to be a few years old, it was of him and her, well not her, but someone that looked like her, on her left hand, was a diamond ring, they were both laughing in the photo, they both looked to be in love.

She sighed again, before looking over to a newer one, it was from the other day, just after they had gotten out over the water, she had been outside on the upper deck, enjoying the sun, and the breeze, her left hand, pushing some of her hair, back behind one of her ears, and there he stood, his black jacket open, leaning with his back to the water, looking up at the sky.

She turned it and the older one over, on the back of the newer picture, it read

Happy birthday Commander Kross

_Thanks for all your hard work._

_-Miriallia H._

She was shocked, he hadn't said a word about his birthday, and some how Miriallia had found out, and managed to snap a picture of herself and Alexander, with out either Murrue or Alexander having noticed, but it was the writing on the back of the other one, that tugged at her,

Alexander and Murrue

_4ever._

No wonder he was so hard on her, the first few weeks. She placed the older one back down, but tapped up the new picture, in a free spot on the mirror.

Alexander fond himself out-side looking over the water, he felt someone sit down beside him, with out saying a word, for several moments, then she spoke, it was that girl in the CIC, "I'm sorry, for thinking that there was something between you and the Captain, she strained everything out, to me. This has got to be rough on you, everyone on the ship knows that you aren't from here, and we do find it, really strange, I mean multiple realities is something right out science fiction, and here you are…"

"There was something between me, and a Murrue Ramius, a long time ago. I'll just say that things were grate, and then bad things happened. It still hurts to think on it, some days. So don't worry about it." He still just looked out over the water, almost looking to see something that wasn't there. "It's just funny, in these two realities, we were brought together, only to get ripped apart… It's not that I haven't given it some thought, it's just I don't want to go through a lot of heart ache right now, and I'm still trying to get my feet under me, right now, so to speak."

Miriallia, looked at him, this was probably one of the few times she'd spoken with him, face to face, not over a radio, he wasn't his usual self, he was always so in control, and here he was, not showing his usual flippant remarks, _Is this the man that only the Captain has seen?_ She thought to herself, "You know, the Captain does care about you, probably a little more then she should, but she always seems happier when your near, rather then when you are out off on some five day reconnaissance mission. She was kind of depressed when you were away, she did her best not to show it, but she was. I know if Tolle was gone for five days, with no word, I'd be sad too. Why don't you go get some sleep, and then go talk to the Captain in the morning? I'm sure she'd be happy to see you, bright and early."

Alexander looked at this girl out of the corner of his right eye, and shrugged, before leaving to his cabin.

It was bright and early in the morning, when she heard a genital; no make that pounding at her door, she rolled over in her bed, to look at the clock, it was still two hours before she had to be up, for her shift. She sighed, pushing herself from her nice warm bed, and wrapped herself in a housecoat, before hitting the open function for the door, that was near her bed.

She yawned as she sat at her desk, rubbing more sleep from her eyes, she smelt the coffee, more then saw it, sitting in front of her, she took a sip, it was just how she liked it, two cream and two sugar, "Thank you, now why are you at my door so early, Commander Kross?"

He smirked, she hadn't even opened her eyes to see him, and he placed one of the trays down in front of her. "I had someone talk some sense into me last night, I've been being a selfish jerk. Thinking only about myself, and not anyone else."

_Damn right you have._ She thought, smiling as she took a second sip, "But that still doesn't explain why you woke me up, two hours early."

"Because I wanted to say, that I'm sorry for being a jerk, and being so cold to you last night, I know that you were trying to help. And that I've been so confused," he sighed before continuing, "You're everything I wish she had been, I find it just shocking how different the two of you are, the Murrue, I knew, she wasn't as caring as you are, but considering the worlds we grew up in, I bet you find me way more callous then the Alexander that you knew?"

She had reached out and patted the back of his left hand, with her right one, she took another sip of her coffee, before opening her golden eyes, letting them show the warmth that was in them, 'I guess that's to be expected, you told me, that the fleets that you grew up in, you are more or less, pressed into military service, only the really privileged children don't have to serve. So it makes sense that you are a little with drawn some times, or a little callous when it comes to things. But then you go and do something like this, showing up, with breakfast, and coffee. Or putting me to bed, and lets not forget hugging me from time to time. It's times like that, that I enjoy, and I wish were a little more frequent, but I understand."

He smiled at her, probably the first smile that didn't feel forced on his end, he didn't have to be a predator of the skies in here, with her, he could be himself, and he liked that. "Murrue, when we get to Alaska, what's going to happen? I'd like to…" his face was actually turning a bit red, she hadn't seen him blush, sure, he'd made her blush, more and more lately, but he was blushing now.

She stood, still holding his hand in hers, and walked over to the window, he fallowed, not letting go, when they both stood at the window, she leaned her head against his shoulder, "I don't know, but I'd like to see where things go, right now, I'm happy. And that is enough for this moment."

They found that girl that had gone missing, she didn't talk about what happened on the island that she was on, but no-one really pressed her on it, as sure enough, the ship found itself in more battle, soon afterwards.

But fate would take a turn, on a few days after, they were passing near the Orb union, when they came under vicious attack, the machines had launched, the Strike fought from the Arc-Angel, attacking the flight units for the X numbers, well Sky-Grasper 01 tried to support to it's best ability. The Typhoon pressed the attack, well going after missile interception, and trying to pull the attention of the X numbers.

The Arc-Angel took blow after blow, weapons fired in every direction, as a missile flew passed the X number that was known as the Duel, it exploded in a shower of fragments, just as the Typhoon had come around, the fragments were sucked into the starboard turbine, only Miriallia hear it, it was spoken in haste, with some fear in the voice, "Oh shit!"

Everyone watched with baited breath, this was the first time, that there had been a friendly-fire incident, for the Arc-Angel, and that was when it happened, the Typhoon shuttered, fallowed by an explosion, from inside, as black-smoke started to billow out from the starboard engine.

The Typhoon climbed as fast as it could, with the black smoke billowing out, the port side engine stuttered, and the control surfaces lost air-flow, the craft started to tumble around, rolling and spinning, violently, once the craft had come back into view, that black smoke had become black smoke and fire, the port side engine had come back on, but the damage had been done.

Murrue's heart sank, they had just started getting to really know each other, and now it looked as fate was going to tare them apart again, her ship was crashing into the ocean, that girl that had hitched a ride, had turned out to be the princess of Orb, and then she saw his face, behind his flight mask, the cockpit was full of that black smoke and that alarm was ringing so loud in the background, his helmet's glass was reflecting all those red lights from the indicators, "Open the hanger, have emergency and fire crews on stand-by, I'm going to try and put her down, in one peace, but be ready to push the wreckage into the ocean."

Half floating in the water, the port side landing way opened, the crash nets sprung into place, and the air-lock door was left open, the white craft lined up on the glide slope, but was having trouble staying in line, the fire leaking out of the starboard side, had gotten bigger, and was threatening to make it's way over to the port side engine.

The craft slammed to the deck, and came to a skidding halt in the hanger bay, as the fire crews ran to put out the flame.

* * *

Well I hope that was a good second chapter, and again, thank you all for reading this far.

If anyone would like me to go into more depth on things, just let me know, in the review section, and I'll to my best to go over it, in the notes at the beginning of each chapter.


	3. Chapter 3

Feathers and Bones Feathers and Bones

Chapter 3: by dawns early light

A/N:

Amir-015, I'd like to say thanks for the information, that you provided me with in the reviews, I'll do my best to include those reactions, but now I'm finding that I wish I had seen that series before hand, if I had, I never would've named the Typhoon, with that number, I probably would've gone with the number of one of my other favorite air-craft, probably the 37… ahh well, do please forgive me on that. Though I'd rather not have a macross class cannon mounted on a something as small as a VT, if I can help it, since I don't want the craft to be able to school the G.U.N.D.A.M.s

This chapter is more about the people, and the month and a bit of down time, between the major events of the series.

Right, now on with the show!

* * *

It had been just over a day, since he'd gotten out of sick bay, the crash landing, had caused him to dislocate his right shoulder, but considering that was the worst of his injuries that was a bit of blessing. But he did it; it brought his bird in, with her now clipped wings, he watched from the sidelines as the starboard engine, well what was left of it anyways, was removed from they Typhoon.

It had once been a Rolls Royce FF-2550D turbine, one of the most powerful engines ever developed by mankind, now it was a lump of twisted blackened metal. All that happened was it sucked in peaces of a missile, they flew into the fan blades, for something so very powerful, and yet something so very fragile, all it took was one blade to become damaged, that lead to another one being knocked lose, having the engine rip itself apart, in an explosion, of fire and smoke.

A woman with blondish brown hair, and a red jacket stood just behind the tall man, with copper blond hair, who's right arm was in a sling, "Are you sure, you want to let us play with the other engine?" she asked, deep inside she wanted to poke around it's secrets, she saw the images of this craft in action, and her mind raced with ideas for the next generation of mobile suites for Orb.

"I don't have much choice, your company is the best, at least that's what Murrue said, but my question is, can you copy the working engine in time, for the repairs to be completed on the Arc-Angel?" he hadn't even looked in her direction yet.

In exchange for copying the engine, they would be given data, on machines similar to this one, she knew that the data wouldn't be on this one, but probably older models, but this type of mecha, would double their machines and versatility with just one mobile suite. "I'm sure we can do it, we'll try to use as much as we can, from the damaged one, but I can't tell you for sure, that your little lady there, won't know the difference."

He nodded and walked away, content with her skill with machines, to try and get his bird ready to fly again.

Alexander walked the halls of the ship, and found himself standing in front of her door again, he knocked softly, last time he did, she had been out, and not answered, that had been shortly after he'd gotten out of sickbay, when he heard her voice call "Enter" from the other side of the door, he walked in, with the door sliding shut behind him.

She smiled at him, she was happy to see him, up and moving. Her mind shot back, to her running through the halls of the ship, just in time to get to the hanger, as the cockpit was pried open, and he was pulled from it, not moving. She watched as they pulled off his helmet, and just tossed it aside, well pulling his flight gear open, and starting C.P.R. on him, right there on the flight deck

She remembered feeling sick, as she watched the female nurse, trying to get him to breathe, and at seeing his right arm, slightly lower then it should be, but also feeling relived when she heard him cough, and groaned, as they placed him on a stretcher.

"I'm glad to see you up and about Alex, I… I was scared when I saw you being pulled out of the Typhoon." She felt a tear come to her eye, as he gave her a weak smile, before sitting across from her.

"How did things go, with the government of Orb? I imagine that they aren't too happy with having us here." He winced a little as he sat, he still hurt all over, and he was told he had bumps and burses in several places.

"It went, not exactly poorly, but we're to leave as soon as we are repaired, and there was other parts of the deal, like having to give over the Strike's combat data, as well as lending Kira to Morgenroete for assistance in making their mobile suites better." She sighed, both pleased and unhappy at the same time.

"Doesn't sound much different then what I had to give up, to try and get a new engine for the Typhoon, they are going to salvage what they can, from the wreaked one, well fabricating new parts to match the working one. In exchange they wanted data on missiles, and VF's, so I'll let them have data on older models, just not the Typhoon. And for the record I still hurt, in a lot of places." He said, trying to get comfortable on the couch.

"We're going to be here, at least a month, I managed to get clearance for off duty personnel to leave the ship, with out your fighter, you are more or less off duty, so why not go out and explore the city?" she asked, a little hopeful.

"I would, but I didn't bring any civilian clothing with me, it was going to be shipped to me, on the next transport. And my uniform would stick out like a sore thumb, my insignias are different then anything you've got as far as I've seen." His eyes were shut, as he finally found a comfortable spot.

Murrue blinked a couple of times, she'd taken for granted that she had all of her personnel effects with her, her clothing, her books, everything. She looked at him resting, sort of, "How about we go shopping then, we'll find you something to wear, when not on duty, and not a uniform, before you protest, I've got some money saved up, since I'm willing to bet, you've got nothing that you can use."

He was smiling, "Yup, my account, for starters is where my job is, and so is any chance of being able to spend any of it. I appreciate this Murrue; I guess I could go with out the jacket that would look somewhat normal I'd think. Though I can't help but think I'm being a bit of a drain on my girlfriend, for this."

Her cheeks turned bright pink, with his last sentence, "did you mean that?" she asked, her words so soft, barely a whisper.

"Yes, I did. Kind of feels like we've been seeing each other, for a wile now, nothing official anyways, well I guess I just formalised it huh?" he asked, looking at her, his jade green eyes, showing something playful about them.

All she could do, was smile happily, as she moved to sit beside him, and rest her head on his left shoulder, well holding his hand in her lap.

Just over 15 days had come and gone, 15 happy days for Alexander, he'd gone outside, walked in the sun, even explored the city a little, and spent much time with Murrue, the two of them, were in one of the hangers at Morgenroete, they'd taken the Typhoon over in large vertical take off and landing transport plane, some five days earlier, claiming that they needed to do some fit testing, rather then trucking the engine back and forth all the time, it'd be easier to just have the Typhoon on the grounds.

They had the hanger door wide-open, and the new Rolls Royce FF-2550D (M) turbine, was undergoing it's first trials to try and match it's thrust to the working one. Erica Simmons, walked over to the two of them, smiling, before she asked, "That was really amazing, I hadn't even thought about that kind of shielding, to protect the nuclear reaction! Who ever designed that thing, was a genius. The N-jammers can't affect that engine. It has almost unlimited power."

Murrue looked over at Alexander, he had omitted that from the data he'd given her, on the Typhoon, that it's engines were nuclear, she was shocked, "What other secrets are you not telling me about that craft?"

"A lot. Remember I said it had a lot of secrets I didn't want to hand over that was one of them. How about if I told you, those four big missiles, which are sitting in storage on the ship, are nuclear as well, they have the same kind of shielding as the engines on the Typhoon. By the way, that engine isn't running right yet, I can hear it, look at changing the bearings along the axial shaft." He was looking at the column of blue-white fire being belched from the open hanger door.

"But I've seen people warming their hands in the exhaust of it, if it was nuclear they couldn't do that…" she was a little upset at not being told, as Alexander cut it, "That is the beauty of the shielding, as well as the cooling systems, the radiation passes through a second and third chamber in the engine where it's removed, and put back into the reactor, to reduce the power needs of the next reaction, thus letting more power be applied to the thrust, how else do I get nearly 30 to one, thrust to weight ratios?"

"Personally, I'm impressed with those engines, but they are way to costly to make, if we do make something like this Typhoon of yours, we're going to have to be a little more conventional at least in our perspective, for the power plants." Said the woman with the red jacket, leaning against the railing, over looking the test.

"I want that engine back in the Typhoon as soon as possible, testing it, here on the ground is one thing, but actually having it undergoing the stress of a dog-fight is another." He finished with his eyes firmly on the new engine.

It would be another two days before the engine was able to be placed into the Typhoon, and to Alexander's as well as the Typhoon's feelings the engine was as good as new, it held up under the strain of air-combat, to show their admiration, with a tower full of people including a couple of pilots from the Orb military, the Typhoon was brought in low over the air-field, and went super sonic, as it shot off the end of the runway, he placed the nose skyward, took off like a shot, a pinkie-white ring fell over the facilities, as the shock wave fallowed.

The person manning the RADAR blinked several times, before saying "That can't be right…"

Murrue looked over to the man, as Erica asked, "What can't be right?"

"That craft, the Typhoon, it's only been climbing for two minuets, but it's already passed 120km, make that, it's now descending." Said the RADAR tech, watching the blip.

"Some secrets…" whisper Murrue, as she looked back into the sky.

Alexander had shifted to the soldier configuration, and free fell towards the ground, with his chest looking out at the stars, the feeling of weightlessness bringing a smile to his face, he kept an eye on the altimeter, as it counted down, he moved the surfaces to give himself a bit of spin.

Murrue watched this through the binoculars, and she smiled, well thinking _He's having fun, for just about three weeks now, he's been like a little kid, that's been told he couldn't go out and play._

As the altimeter reached 2km, he went back to the Jet configuration, and dove, to the point that his vision was hazed over in red, he could feel the Typhoon shutter with joy, she was being pushed to her limits, he pulled back on the stick, and pushed the peddles to change the direction of the thrust, to bring himself level.

Everyone in the tower watched as the white, black and yellow fighter got closer to the ground, and then levelled out, the tips of it's engines just about scraping the ground, then shot off like a bullet again, "Can some one get me an estimate on his low level speed?" asked Erica as she watched this, a few officers from the Orb air defence command, were also watching this with grate interest.

"Our estimates based on RADAR waves place it, above Mach 6.5…" there was a hushed awe after the speed was announced, they watched as it did a turn, that would shatter most anything they had ever made to fly before, it turned around, in less then 100km, the craft slowed down, to sub sonic over the runway, as it came back, then flipped around in it's body length, the two Orb officers cringed at that, only imaging the stresses on the pilot, and machine at that point.

It flew to just off the runway, and flipped around again; slowed and lowered it's landing gear, to touch softly to the ground.

Everyone exited the tower, and hurried over to where the Typhoon came to a halt, the cockpit opened, and it's pilot started to climb down.

"Well?" asked the engineer in the red jacket, she was eager to here what the pilot thought.

"The balance of both the thrust, and the weight was a little off, but not by much, it'll do." Spoke the pilot, as he pulled his helmet off, grinning as broadly as he could.

Murrue found herself smiling as well, he looked so happy, and she had no idea, that his fighter could do, nearly half of what it had shown today.

"How soon, before they are available to the Orb military? I can't wait to fly one." asked one of the officers, as he walked up, to touch the Typhoon.

"Sorry boys, that was a privet contract with another group to repair some damage it sustained in battle. It's not Morgenroete property." Said the engineer, as she looked to the ground crew, to get the craft ready for delivery.

Once they had gotten back to the ship, Murrue walked to the weapons locker, where the heavy missiles were being stored for the Typhoon, she looked at them, just sitting on the racks, nothing special about them, till she walked up, and started to notice the decals that were placed near the tips of the missiles, little yellow circles with three black triangles, with a black dot in the middle.

"See, they are just like I said, a nasty peace of work, aren't they?" said a voice from behind her, she jumped a little, he walked over, and ran a hand across the casing, before he continued, "They are meant for braking the back of a warship, with just one blow. The Typhoon is able to carry four, but a Spectre class bomber can load up eight of them, to go ship hunting with."

"How close are the engagements between fleets?" she asked, eyes still locked on this weapon of mass death.

"A few thousand Km's apart, there is an attack group, and escort group, and a defence group, with multiple waves for each group. The Victoria, had 96 craft, that's eight squadrons, five squadrons were fighters like the Typhoon and three were Spectre squadrons." He crossed around the missile to stand beside her, "My squadron, VAF-103 the Jolly Rogers, usually flew interception missions, we had to stop craft carrying things like this, getting through to the colony fleet." He finished not sure if he should place a hand on her shoulder or not.

"So, when you shot up into the air, after your starboard engine went out, that was trying to be safe of?" she asked, now looking at him.

"On the off chance that the core, of either engine went into melt-down, and caused a catastrophic chain reaction." He knew he was giving the official term for it, but he would've rather called it 'going stellar.'

"So nuclear explosion?" she asked, backing away from the missile.

"More or less, usually when a VF is destroyed, there isn't much left, the cores hardly ever go off, but it can happen. That was how a friend of mine died actually, her Typhoon's engines were hit, they swallowed a fragmentation missile, kind of like I did, and they just went off. One minuet she was there, the next she was a bright ball of light." He said as he started to walk out of weapons locker. As she watched him walk away, she hurried to fallow, the way things were going, they were going to be leaving Orb soon, so she wanted to spend as much time as she could with him right now.

And it happened, a soon as they left Orb they came under attack, though they managed to play for some advantage, and even managed to destroy one of the machines, the Blitz, but the scars on the young pilot Kira, would take there toll.

"I don't care, that kid isn't ready to be out in a dog fight yet. Crewmen Koenig shouldn't be flying yet!" hollered Alexander in the Captain's cabin, after getting the senior staff together.

"He said he could do it, and he did do alright out there." Piped up Natarle.

Alexander looked over to Mu, whom only nodded, "Saying you can do it, and actually being able too, with out drawing fire, that's what a spotter 'should' be doing, just that spotting for the units with limited sight range. Not going 'hey! I can help too by shooting at this one!', that's why I'm saying he's not ready." He was seething, he'd been against Tolle going out into combat.

"Irregardless, he was out there, and conducted himself with ability." Continued Natarle.

Murrue sat and watched this heated exchange, she could see both sides of the fence, Alexander was speaking as someone whom had the combat experience to know when a pilot is ready, but Natarle was correct by backing Crewmen Koenig in his actions, she sighed, this was getting them no where.

Alexander catching Murrue's sigh, he gritted his teeth, and finished, "Fine, if you want to send him out, into combat, that's your business, I'm not part of your military, but just remember, if he dies, his blood is on your hands Lieutenant." And with that he left the office.

Alexander found his quarry sitting in the mess hall with his friends, he walked in, pointed at Koenig, and said "You, with me, now."

Tolle could only gulp as he stood up, to fallow Alexander as he stormed out of the mess hall, he fallowed him into the lockers, where he was greeted by flight gear being tossed at him, "Put those on, I am going to try and teach you something that might keep you alive, and we are going to practice them, till you can go and do them, with out much brain power to think them through, or you pass out, what ever happens fist."

Tolle was about to protest, when Alexander continued, "I know you are not ready for actual combat, but I'll be damned if I'm just going to stand by, and let you go out there, with out knowing what you are doing. If it was up to me, I'd only let you out to fly, on bright sunny days, with both myself and Commander La Flaga, near by, just encase you get into trouble. But the X.O. in her infant wisdom, thinks you are ready for actual combat."

They both suited up, and walked out into the hanger, Tolle headed for the Typhoon, but was stopped by Alexander as he said, "Forget it, she would kill you, we are going in a Sky-Grasper, you are going to be flying them, so you are going to learn in them."

They climbed into the craft, Tolle was in the front seat, with Alexander behind them, with clearance granted, and they were launched into the sky.

"Alright, Crewmen Koenig, you have control, lets see what you can do." Came Alexander's voice over the radio.

Miriallia, had gone up to the bridge to watch, and listen in, to what her love was going to be put through, she watched from the window as Tolle flew around, turning and twisting, as well as looping.

"Turn it tighter, if you get to the point where it's hard to see, because you are starting to pass out, then you are turning too hard. The harder you turn, the heavier you should feel," with that Alexander pitched the Sky-Grasper vertical.

Tolle felt his body become heavy, he was having a hard time keeping his hands on the controls, his vision was getting dark, and then almost instantly it went away, as the aircraft levelled off. "That was positive 6 G climb, and this," Alexander pitched the craft nose down, Tolle found himself starting float, his vision becoming hazy with red over everything, and again it went away almost right away, when the craft levelled out, "was negative 6 G dive."

Though the sound that greeted Alexander, wasn't one he'd been expecting, the young man in front of him, had reached for the bag, which was under his seat, and heaved into it. Alexander rolled his eyes, _How am I got to get this kid ready for battle if all he's going to do, is lose his lunch, pulling manoeuvres like this?_

Miriallia, had put the radio over the speaker, and watched, it was easy to tell when Tolle was in control, and when Commander Kross was flying, one set of movements looked almost sloppy, well the other looked very practiced.

She was joined on the bridge by Murrue, whom asked "Crewmen Haw, have you seen or heard from Commander Kross?"

She got her answer, when she heard his voice over the radio, "No, do it again, that was sloppy, if you can't do that turn in less time, whom ever is shooting at you, will lead you, and hit you with there next shot. Don't worry about the craft, it can handle more then you can. Push yourself as hard as you can, with that next turn."

"How long have they been out there?" Murrue asked, looking at the young woman.

Miriallia touched the glass, before she spoke, "Almost three hours now, he's being really hard on Tolle, I don't know what Tolle did, to get this kind of punishment, but it must've been bad."

"It's not really a punishment, Commander Kross, just wants to get Crewmen Koenig up to speed, he doesn't think that the Crewmen should be flying in combat yet. I can see his point the team we are facing is first rate, and by putting the Crewmen through this, it just might make the difference between living and dieing for him." Said Murrue, as she joined her by the glass.

"Better, but try it again, this time, I want to see you combine a positive G turn, with a negative G dive."

"ye… Yes sir!"

"Your right, he can be rather hard on someone, when he thinks it's needed, Commander Kross, has a lot of experience as a combat pilot, a lot more then even Commander La Flaga. I think had we known that Crewmen Koenig had an interest in flying, we would've had him doing this much sooner, rather then getting a crash course in combat flight." Said Murrue, as she watched the weather turn to rain.

When the first few drops hit the windscreen, Alexander took the controls, and lined them up for a return, well he spoke, "Alright, it's time to go in, tomorrow, we'll do more of this."

When they were both in the locker room, Tolle looked over to Alexander, and asked, "Commander, can I ask you something?"

Alexander had just put his pants on, and smiled, "What's on your mind kid?" his voice was so much more gentile.

"Well sir, I understand why you got me out there, but I was wondering why you wanted to do it in the first place?" said the boy, as he pulled his jacket on.

"I've seen too many inexperienced pilots get killed, because they were sent into combat before they were ready. I've also had to write letters to there families, telling them why their son or daughter is now dead. And I think that, that is part of the reason why I was being assigned a teaching position at a combat school." He finished as he closed his jacket, and locker. "Part of battle is skill, and knowing what to do, then comes that one little other part, that no-one can account for, and that is fate, and believe me, she can be a real bitch."

"Commander, how long have you been a pilot? I only ask, since you talk like you've been doing it, a very long time." Asked the boy, nearing the door.

"Since I was your age." Was all Alexander said, as he left the room, to get something to eat.

The next day, started off with a bang, the three remaining X numbers attacked, again, looking for blood. The players had taken their places, and a desperate battle took place, but the hands of fate, were hovering over a string, ready to cut it…

The Typhoon, had singled out the Duel, not able to fight how he wanted too, Alexander was forced to fight in his Gerwalk mode.

Yzak watched his enemy change forms, he'd come to hate it, almost as much as the strike, even in this mode he was finding it fast, and agile, he cursed at it, as they got stuck into a turning fight, every time he had it lined up, it'd just mange to slip passed the shot, or duck behind some rocks, "Dearka, get behind it! Lets cut it off."

"Sorry Yzak, kind of busy here with a little fly, you're on your own." Came the reply from his friend. They had already managed to fell the legged ship, it was on the ground, and Athrun was locked in a duel with the Strike.

That was when it happened in that split second of not watching a missile from that white, black and yellow mobile suite hit his Guul, forcing him to the ground. Yzak, could only curse, it had vanished behind those rocks again, he drew a beam sabre and walked towards the rocks, well keeping it under fire from his rail gun.

On the other side of the rock, the Typhoon was in it's soldier configuration, in the rain it's particle beam was more or less useless, he couldn't count on the rail gun either, it's pilot tried a desperate gamble, but he had to buy his time.

Yzak was just about on top of the rock now, all he had to do, was jump over it, and he'd have that one, he'd kill it's pilot, and take it back as a prize, he boost jumped over the rock, in time to see the white leg of that unit, come around, it's foot had an odd glow to it.

It all happened so slowly for Yzak, he had his sabre slightly behind him, ready to swing, as the foot came around and hit the Duel in the shoulder joint, right under the Shiva rail gun, with a grate shutter, he felt the arm separate off his Duel, like it had been struck via a beam sabre.

For Alexander, he heard the master alarm go off, telling him, that the barrier was down, again, but it had bought him time to fire his engines and get away, with the barrier down, he really couldn't stick around and fight these X machines.

Yzak punched his console in front of him, he had to retreat now, this white one would pay, and in time it would pay.

Alexander landed his fighter, in the docking bay, taking his usual spot next to where Sky-Grasper 02 would be, when it got back.

He went up to the bridge to see how things were going, he didn't even make it there, when he saw Miriallia outside the bridge, her face in her hands, sobbing, she was sitting on the floor, he placed a hand on her shoulder, before he could ask what was wrong, "Tolle and Kira are both dead."

He felt it, that pang of guilt, that stabbed at him, like ice water, he reached out, and took the girl's arm, and lifted her into a hug, as he gently rubber her back, it wasn't long, before one of her other friends exited the bridge, he looked at the blond one, and mouthed out "take her now."

The blond boy took his friend's hand and slowly led here away, well Alexander hurried back to the flight deck, to start to look for wreckage, or bodies.

Leaving those islands, one would've thought that the dark clouds would've stayed there, but the white ship moved on wards, trying to out run the black cloud that hung over head.

"I've been thinking about this run to Alaska, and I can't help but feel un-easy about it Murrue." He said softly, looking out the window, at the braking waves.

Her mind sent her back to just after that battle that left Ensign Yamato and Crewmen Koenig, counted as either M.I.A. or K.I.A.

She had gone down to the hanger to see him, and had gotten there just in time to see him, place a black tarp on the ground, from the hand of the Typhoon, as he placed the nose to the ground, and got out.

He called over to Petty Officer Murdoch to bring a coffin, when it had gotten over to him; they tossed the black tarp, into the coffin, with a soggy thud, and closed the lid.

"Was that…?" her words trailed off, as she saw the orangey yellow helmet, that was blood stained, it's glass shattered, be placed on top of it.

"It was, he's just hamburger now, but I thought his parents would at least like to be able to burry him. I couldn't find any trace of Yamato, but I didn't have a lot of time to look." He was fighting back a tear or two, she could see it, "Do you want me to write the letter? Also, I wouldn't let Crewmen Haw see the body, there's not much left, and what is there, really isn't something some so young should see."

Murrue had begun to cry, she hadn't had to really deal with the aftermath of death yet, true there had been explosions onboard, but no one had died yet, but there had been wounded. "I… I wouldn't know what to say to them." Her words were so soft, all he did was nod.

That had been two weeks ago, she had read the letter that was going to be sent to the Koenig's, with the coffin, when they had managed to get to Alaska, it had read.

Dear Mr. And Mrs Koenig,

It is with deep regret I have to inform you, that your son Petty Officer third class Tolle Koenig (Promoted posthumously) was killed in the line of duty on April 17th CE 71. Well flying air support for the Earth Forces ship Arc-Angel.

He was a valued member of the crew; first to speak in defence of those he'd come to care for, he will be deeply missed. I wish I had taken more time to get to know him, but I hadn't and now that is a loss, which I will have to live with. I know that this letter will bring you little comfort, but take heart in the fact that your son died bravely protecting others, and did not suffer.

With deep heart felt sorrow,

Lt. Commander Alexander Kross.

Commander Air Group of the Battle ship Arc-Angel.

She had wanted to give him a hard time, about signing the letter, himself and claiming to be the C.A.G., but he'd taken care of gathering up personal effects of Tolle, giving most of them to Miriallia, well sending much with the coffin, even put a pair of wings in the coffin.

"Alex, thank you for taking care of things with the remains, I know it wasn't easy…" she finally spoke, to him, as he stood at the window.

"Don't worry about it, I've had to write a lot of those…" he sighed, "I told her, he wasn't ready to fight yet. If we'd been with U.N. Spacy he'd still been in flight school, the worst he'd have to see would be crosswinds, on his way into land. He was too young."

"But you had said, that you were only 16 when you started flying for U.N. Spacy…" she said, having moved to stand with him at the window.

"True, but I was marked for pilot status when I was 12, I under went the modifications when I was 13, and started training when I was 14, I had over three hundred logged flight hours, before we even started combat manoeuvres, and after wards, when I was shipped off to my first unit, I had almost a thousand hours logged, between atmospheric and space flight. That was the difference. He had what? Less then a hundred hours, before he was sent out, into combat." his words were soft, and hurt at the same time, she could tell that this death was hitting Alexander hard.

"Alex, why is this hitting you so hard? I mean you've been part of the crew, but kept some distance between you and everyone else. Even me to some degree." She had turned him to look at her; she saw it, a tear slide down his cheek.

"That kid Tolle, I saw potential in him, I also saw a lot of me, in him. All he wanted to do was his part, no matter what was asked of him, he'd try and do it. And sorry for claiming to be the C.A.G. but we should've selected either myself of Mu, a wile back. Had we done that, Lieutenant Badgiruel wouldn't have been able to over rule the C.A.G., since they have final say on who can and who can't go up. But hind sight is twenty, twenty." He was fighting them back, he didn't want to cry over this, he'd signed hundreds of those letters over the years.

Murrue hugged him, before saying "I don't know what is going to happen as Alaska, but know that I'll stick with you, if you can stand by me… even if you can't really do that, since if they knew everything, you'd probably be taken for study."

"And that's what I was getting too, I'm not so sure I want to go to Alaska… I liked Orb, but no matter where I go, my Typhoon is going to probably be taken from me, and pulled apart to be studied, and I'll more then likely be imprisoned for study as well. Part of me, just wants to go home, but home isn't home any more. Home isn't just a place, it's people, like the Victoria, the Arc-Angel is just as much my home now." He had closed his eyes, and rested his head in her chocolate coloured hair, taking in the scent of the rose hair and body wash she used.

"I know Alex, I really do. And I've been thinking about it too, maybe you could hide the Typhoon on board, well you hid some where, encase we are inspected when we get to Alaska… I really don't want you to go." She spoke as she pressed herself against him, she really did enjoy being held. "We'll think of something."

"I was thinking of heading into space, going to that point where I popped out, into this reality, maybe see, if it barrier was weak there, see if I could get a communications burst through. I could also swing by Orb, and deliver Tolle's body personally." He said, eyes still shut, as the light from the sun sunk below the waves.

"Okay, but if anything happens, go to Orb, I'm sure that they will take you in. I'll miss you, but I'll understand. If… if you'd like to stay over tonight, I wouldn't mind." She added the last part so quietly that she was sure that he'd missed the offer.

He awoke early, looking around the room, seeing that it wasn't his, then he noticed the warm spot in the bed beside him, and he smiled, remembering the night, he watched her sleep, she looked so peaceful, a smile on her lips, her breathing shallow, but regular.

He reached out, and touched her hair, and she stirred a little, before rolling over, the blankets spilling over, as she slowly opened an eye, and smiled well whispering "Morning."

"Did you sleep well?" he asked, before kissing her forehead.

She smiled, and then snuggled closer to him, "Very much so, have you been awake long?"

"Not very long, but long enough to see how lucky I am," he placed an arm around her, and drew her in close, "I'll head after breakfast, to Orb, then to space… I don't know how long I'll be, but I'll come back to you, I promise that."

She yawned, and rested her head on his chest, letting the rhythmic breathing lull here off to sleep again.

He'd dropped the body off to the family, it had been a tearful event, but he thought that it brought them peace, to have their son at rest, in his homeland. He'd expected his family to be angry with him, since he took responsibility for Tolle's death.

How ever, he did explain to them, how it happened, and what had gone on before hand, Tolle's father was tearful, but his eyes showed pride for what his son had done, as well with the words that Alexander had left them with, "Your son lived and died a hero, no matter what else he may have been, or could have been, that was how he will always be remembered, by me, at least."

With that he aimed the Typhoon skyward, and shot into space, leaving that ring of pinkie-white air behind him.

* * *

I know, a bit of a sad chapter, but I was really aiming to have it 'Darkest before the dawn.' But again, thank you for reading this far.

The next chapter is going to have more action, so please stay tuned.

Also, anything that you ask, in the review section, I'll do my best to tackle in the A/N at the start of the next chapter.


	4. Chapter 4

Rocket's Red Glair

Rocket's Red Glair

A/N:

Amir-015,

I want to thank you again, for your feedback, and for pointing me onto being able to see Macross Frontier, I've got to wait till episode 21 is out, but it was kind of sad at the end of 20… I'll do my best to try and bring in more of the characters, and their points of view. I do like the dogfights that are seen in Frontier, and they are very much the kind of fighting that the U.N. Spacy pilots have a preference for, but some times you just can't get the kind of fights you want.

I also included a bit of the song "What 'bout my star?" by Sheryl Nome from Macross Frontier.

And to everyone else that has been kind enough to give me their thoughts on things, thank you again, and I hope I continue to be worthy of your parse.

On with the show!

He'd been out here for weeks now, trying different combinations, his rations were running low, he had stolen air when he could from the wreckage of ships, as well as food and water, or found areas that still had atmosphere, to try and sleep. He didn't know why he was even really trying anymore, the more time he spent at it, the less it seemed like he was getting through, and he missed her deeply, the way she'd smile, or wrinkle her nose when she annoyed.

He sighed again, as much as he'd try, this world wasn't his, and it'd never really be a world someone like him could live in. He sat in his craft drifting with the cosmic winds that blew, hoping that some how, his plea for help would be heard.

That was when it happened, there was a ball of multi coloured light, and his sensors picked it up, a big blue dot, on his RADAR screen, it would be another pulse before the transponder of the ship had identified it's self, his lips curled in a smile, as he powered up his engines and flew to the ship, one word was on his mind, _home_.

"Jolly Roger 01, I have the ball." He called into the radio, as he lined up in the glide slope behind the ship, the massive four engines glowing white, and its blue deck, lit up, with yellow landing lights for him.

"Copy, Jolly Roger 01, has the ball." Came the L.S.O. over the radio, "And welcome back." Her voice was playful to him.

The Typhoon slammed down on the deck, then taxied over to the elevators, to be taken below decks, once in the hanger, Alexander taxied the craft to its position, at the far end of the hanger, like usual.

As the engines powered down, and the cockpit opened, he heard a soft, familiar voice call up to him, from under the Typhoon, "Glad to have you back Commander, everything alright?"

"That's a long story chief, I've got to talk to the captain right now, but well I'm gone, could you pull the starboard engine, and replace it, it's not been running right, ever since I got it repaired, also, could you give the Typhoon some TLC, she's been flying round the clock, for the last four and a bit months, with out seeing proper maintenance she's long over due, and maybe a little cranky because of it." He called to her, as he climbed down, not forgetting about having gravity in the hanger.

The Chief Petty Officer hugged him from behind, before speaking "Sorry sir, it's just nice to see you back, and I'll see to your bird, but I want to know what happened to her, when you are done talking with the Captain…"

He smiled before heading off, "Sure thing Chief."

She sighed as he left, and started to pull panels from the Typhoon, it was the second or third one, that she pulled, near the starboard landing gear, after seeing that it had taken some damage, that the sand poured out of it, and she spoke to the Typhoon, "Looks like you've been playing in the sand, little Missy."

He climbed the stairs two at a time still in his flight gear saluting on the way, once he reached the Captain's ready room he knocked twice.

"Enter." Came, the rough voice of the ship's captain.

Alexander smiled to himself, it wasn't her voice, but it was one that made him feel at home. The door opened and closed once he was inside, "I thought you would've been on Terra by now, Captain Kross."

_Captain?_ His mind raced, "Sir, that's jumping me passed Commander…"

"I know, but that was what was waiting for you, on Terra anyways, you'd proven yourself ready to lead, handled the combat operations of eight fighter squadrons, taken care of the people under your command, I made the recommendation months ago, I received word, with your orders to that my request had been granted, you are a Naval Captain… Though I do wonder what you've been up to, since your little vacation started." The Captain of the Victoria grinned, looking at Alexander, he was so proud of the boy, "You mother and I, are both very pleased with you Alex, you've done very well to advance so far, in so little time."

"Thank you Sir, but as to my activities, they've been many. I found myself trapped here, some four and a bit months ago. I've picked a side, no a person, to stand beside here, in this world. They are at war with themselves, and the person I've chosen to stand beside, has been facing hard times, since the start of this war." Alexander had taken a seat, across from his father.

"Well that does make things interesting, and before you ask, we looked at the calibration on your message, before I posed the question to the crew, about coming here, knowing that it would be a one-way trip. So, who is this person, I hope 'she' is in the military, of some kind." Asked the older man, his hair a silvery white, as he placed his white cap on his cherry wood desk.

"Yes sir, she is in a military, but the way things have gone, I haven't heard from her in a wile, the base she was at was destroyed, I haven't been back to earth to look, for her." He had looked away, out the port side window, just as Earth had come into view.

His father smiled, "I understand, I would've let your mother be here too, but one of us needs to be on duty, besides this is something that isn't just a family reunion, I need information about what I've brought my ship into."

Alexander filled his father in, on the details, about what had happened to him in the last four and a bit months, about the battles he'd fought, the lack of effectiveness against the top-end machines of this world, that his Typhoon had, yet it out-classed the more common units.

"So, what do you think we should do Alex?" came his mother's voice, she was X.O. of the Victoria, she had a smile that made the entire room feel warm and inviting, her golden blond lochs, and radiant red eyes, she sat beside her son, as they had moved to the dinning area of the cabin.

"Well I'd like to go to Orb, see if I can peace together what happened, maybe find out what happened to her." Said Alexander, as he took a mouth full of roasted beef, something he'd not had in the months since he left the Victoria.

"And if you find her, then what? Are you going to stay down there, or are you going to come back up here?" came his father's voice, as he placed his fork down, and laced his fingers together to as he looked at his son.

"A bit of both, I've been watching what's been going on at least, the Atlantic Federation, has poised itself to attack Orb, I think, we should support Orb, if the battle goes badly. I know that the Typhoons will make a difference in any engagement down there, and the ones that are left to be fought out here in space." Alexander closed his eyes, he missed this kind of food, not that the Arc-Angel had been bad food, or that rations were bad, but there was a difference.

Murrue sighed, she hadn't see him in over a month, not even a word, then again, the Arc-Angel had left Alaska, and had returned to Orb, even joined the Orb fleet, but she missed him, but with another battle tomorrow, she didn't have much time to think on it, she had to make sure, her ship was ready to go, the head of the Government had mentioned about sending them into space, that, after the Arc-Angel and the Kusanagi were away, the mass driver would be destroyed, preventing victory to the Earth Forces.

It was going to be a long day tomorrow.

She was singing to herself and the Typhoon as she worked half in, half out of one of the access ports on the plane, the tune was an old one, but she loved it none the less,

_You only get one shot, so let's make it Exciting!_

_Wonderful! Charming you!_

_I want to GET you, lalala._

_We'll sing around the world._

_3. Hey, I count down._

_2. Are you ready?_

_1. I can't wait anymore._

_0. Let my love be heard!_

Her singing was interrupted by some foot steeps coming up behind her, with a slight blush to her cheeks, she pulled herself out of the plane to see him, walking up to her.

She loved him, but new she couldn't have him, so taking care of his plane was the next best thing, to her at least, "Sir, what ever you were putting her though, I'm surprised she's kept going, that engine was not all original parts, don't get me wrong, whom ever made it did a good job, but you would've found the power setting wrong, they set them, based on the port engine, with out the computer telling the engine to applied the modifications I made to the operating system default values."

"What kind of changes?" he asked, as he climbed up on the back of his bird.

"Well I tweaked the engines to give you about 10 more thrust then they should, it means they need more maintenance, but it was the best I could do, after you said that you wished you had a bit more power out of the engines a few years ago…" she trailed off, turning a little pink, and ducking back into the plane.

"You heard me, actually say that? I didn't think anyone actually did… I wish you had told me chief, I would've put you in for a commendation, I just thought I was thinking things, the first time, I took her out after wards…" he leaned over to watch her hard at work, using a vacuum to suck out the sand still.

"And another thing, sand is murder on the systems, what were you thinking, playing in a desert, with out cleaning her out afterwards, these craft are like people. They'll do what's asked of them, and if they love you enough, they'll go that extra mile, but four and a half months with out proper maintenance is asking too much. I'll be surprised if she even lets you fly her again." She knew she was being silly, chiding him like this, but it was what she could do, not to want to push him over, and kiss him, they'd know each other since they were little, and she had been so annoyed when 'she' dumped him. "Ouch!" she cried, as her hand was cut on something, the slice was minor, just enough that she felt it.

Alexander looked for what she might've done, and saw it, a peace of silvery metal, stuck in one of the main hydraulic lines, it was a fan blade, not even a foot away from where his head would be well in flight, he watched as his crew chief sucked on her finger, that had grazed it, well pulling it out with her other hand, and tossing it out of the craft, before calling to him, "Could you hand me a cloth, and get a number 12 hose, from the supply cart? You're lucky, I don't know how long that's been there, but that could've been al kinds of problems, if no one found it."

It took a moment before the hose was handed to her, with a cloth, she placed the cloth over the main fitting will using a wrench to close the valve well pulling the hose, sure enough some of the hydraulic fluid leaked out, and into the cloth, "So, what happened down there? It's not every day, that we see things like fan blades stuck in hydro lines, or that much 'sand' in the panels."

She was half in, and half out of another panel as she spoke, her hips and legs free, and wiggling about as she worked, he couldn't help but smirked, before coming here, and meeting her, he probably would've given Chief Petty Officer Sarah Jones, his crew chief a little more thought, granted he knew the regulations, officers and enlisted were a no-no, but things can be over looked in war time, "A lot, I found that I don't much like sand, it's fine on a beach, but I just don't want it around more then that. And there are some things I wish didn't happen, but they did."

She mumbled out a word, she obviously had something in her mouth at the time, Alexander was able to understand her none the less, "Like, having to live with the fact, that a kid died, and there was nothing I could do about it." He leaned his back against the white body of the Typhoon, and looked out over the deck.

She pulled herself deeper into the fighter, twisting about, before popping her head out over his, she smiled down at him, and her brown jumpsuit had become a little taught against her body, showing off the curves. "Going by the fact that, you aren't looking me over right now, I'd also say you fell in love. But don't let the death of someone get you down Comm… Captain, gosh it's going to take some getting used to, calling you that."

He smiled at her, she was probably his best friend, and defiantly his confident, "You'd be right, but I'm worried about her, I've not heard anything in almost a month and a half… Do you think she'll be ready to fly in the morning?"

Sarah pouted a little, before responding, "Just let me get out of the panels, and she could go now, but that starboard landing gear, sure took a beating, I'm guessing one of the landings was a little rough, huh?"

He nodded, recalling that near fatal event. "Yea, I ate a fragmentation missile through the starboard intake, lost power completely, got it back, and fought to get the Typhoon under control, I managed to put her down on the deck, I remember kicking out sideways, hitting my head then passing out. The next thing I knew, I was looking up at a white ceiling, of the sick bay, with my arm in a sling."

Pulling herself out of the fighter, and sitting beside him, with her tool belt, resting on her left thigh, she smiled at him, well pulling her bright pink hair out of the ponytail, "Captain, don't let it get you down, everyone has a rough landing every now and then. I'm sure where ever she is, she's looking up at the stars, wishing you were with her…I know that if I had a guy like you, I'd be wanting to stand under the stars with him." She playfully pushed him off the Typhoon, before continuing "Now go and see the rest of your squadron, I can get her right as rain, before morning, and if I can't I'll just pull extra people to have her all set."

"Sarah thanks. I think I needed to hear that." He smiled at her, as he left the hanger deck, to the pilot's lounge.

She sighed as he left, then looked back to the Typhoon, "And you little Missy, better be taking good care of him."

Alexander had taken the time to get into a fresh uniform, no longer white and black, but simply white, with four very broad stripes on the shoulders and cuffs, he steeped into the pilot's lounge, and that was when he heard it,

"Captain on deck!" one of the pilots called, and the entire room stood to attention, and saluted him, he smirked, before saying, "Look, just because the uniform has changed, doesn't mean I have."

The room when back to being relaxed, but it was Lieutenant Ramins that walked up to her captain, and placed an arm around his shoulders, her long black hair, that was almost blue, flowing behind her, spoke up, "Well 'Captain Kross' let me be one of the first to buy you a drink, and you can have the squadron back, I'm not ready to lead yet."

"That's good, because we've got flight ops in the morning, so, don't get too hammered." He smiled as he sat at the table, well the bar keep, put his stein in front of him, and poured a dark foamy liquid in.

Ramins couldn't help but groan she'd been looking forward to a night of drinking.

It was revile 05:30 hours Terra standard time, Alexander had donned his flight gear, showing the new rank badge on it, proudly, he felt good it had been a long time, since he stood to give a briefing, it was funny how the little thing were the ones that he missed the most, as he stood in the briefing room, well his squadron, the Jolly Rogers filed in.

"Good morning ladies." He said, knowing that only fully half of the squadron was female, but he couldn't resist teasing his people, they had all been out drinking to the return of their leader, and now they were going to face hell.

Eleven voices responded as one, "Good morning sir!" as they all took their seats, the room darkened, and a holographic display of Earth appeared, it centred over a group of islands in the south pacific, then zoomed, and zoomed again, till they filled the screen.

"This is our target area, the Orb union, as you can see they are beset by a hostile force, we are going to support them. Our goal is make this enemy brake and run. I won't lie, they have flight capable destroids, which can put up a good fight, and a few of them even out class the Typhoon, in terms of defensive capabilities." Has he said that, an image of the Strike, Aegis, Buster, and Duel appeared, and he continued, "How ever, these are special units, not the main fighting force, the back bone units, you'll know them when you see them, there will be a lot of them, that all look a like, they are on par with the old VF-22's so we've got a slight edge on them."

One of his pilots put up his hand, Alexander nodded to him, "Sir, why are we helping this nation? Have they asked for our assistance?"

"Good question, but the answer is no. To make a long story short, I believe my girlfriend is in that nation, and we are going to play 'Knights in shining armour' today." He looked at the looks on his pilots, and sighed at their hushed words, "Look I've been here for almost five months, and you didn't think I'd find someone? And now I think she needs my help, and I finally have the resources to do something, so we are going to do something. If this ship," an image of the Arc-Angel appeared. "Is seen, do not fire on it, it is friendly, and we will support it, as best as we can. We will each be issued one Harpoon Mk VIII, make it count. Beyond that, if it shoots at you, shoot at it, and shoot to kill. We are going down there as 12, and I want 12 to come home. Dismissed!"

"Jolly Roger 01, 02, 03 and 04, you are cleared for launch!" came the voice of the flight controller, as four white, black, and yellow craft were flung into space, at 7 times the effect of gravity. This happened another two times, as the squadron fell into formation behind their leader, he spoke to them.

"Now you all know what we are doing, good luck and happy hunting!" with his words they breached the atmosphere, in steep dives, on their targets.

The battle had started they were all fighting desperately, well trying to get the ships ready for launch, Murrue felt something coming from the sky, she looked sky ward, and thought she saw some shooting stars. She grabbed some binoculars and zoomed in as far as they could, she could see 12 shapes coming at them, and they were white. But she couldn't tell much else about them.

It would be another 30 seconds that she watched them, they were in the circle, they were jets, she could tell that much, with vapour trails like that coming off their wings, all of the bellies were facing each other, it was another 30 seconds before she could make out the markings on one of them, a skull and cross bone decal on it's tails, and that form, she knew it, it was the Typhoon's silhouette, she felt good, for the first time in just over a month, she felt good, that was when she counted them, eleven more of them, just like the one she knew…

As one, they opened the heavy missile bays, and launched their harpoons all at different ships in the Atlantic Federation's fleet, the 12 white fighters broke off into pairs, in their high-speed mode, as they dropped low to the ground, and shot off in different directions.

The crews of the 12 ships didn't even know what hit them, but the rest of the fleet saw what happened, missiles from a ballistic course slammed into the ships, before going off, in an immense explosion, that had felled another thirty ships of the fleet.

Athrun, saw as a pair of these whit craft shoot passed him, at an almost unreal speed, they were low to the water, and that water was shooting up into the air behind them, they were firing missiles, and energy beams at anything that so much as pointed a gun in their direction, in that fraction of a second before he was locked into a duel with one of the Earth Forces new GUNDAM units, his mind was tossed back to that day, in front of the supreme counsel of the PLANT.

I stood in front of them, I had just finished going over the specs on the machines, when I felt a slight nudge from my Commander, before he whispered to me, "Don't forget that white one."

I nodded to him, and brought up one of the few good images we had of it, that sleek profile, with those almost triangular wings, and large intakes on either side of the cockpit. It's white body, with black and yellow highlights. The black circle with a white skull and cross bone decals showing proudly on each wing, as two missiles dropped from their hard points under the wings, and their motors ignited. "This craft, we don't have any data on it, it may be some new kind of mobile armour, what we do know about it, is it is very well armoured, as well as just as, if not more manoeuvrability then even my own Aegis. As seen in this blurry picture, the craft has several large, and small thrusters along the body, that aloud it, to perform a high speed, tight turn, to get back on target, inside of it's own body length," he showed the next series of images he managed to capture, showing the white craft flip around, finishing with a blue white flash from under the craft, "We believe that this," he highlighted the muzzle flash from under the craft, "is some kind of projectile weapon, as it depleted the Phase Shift armour on the Buster, fallowed by a second attack that removed an arm."

There was a hushed awe from the council members, as I continued, "Finally I think that the pilot would have to be a coordinator, and a skilled one at that, to handle this craft so well."

Athrun's mind was sent back to the battle, as a green beam shot across his cockpit, reminding him, that he was still in a battle for Orb.

Mu La Flaga was out in his new machine assisting the M1's as he was knocked onto his back, as two of these white ships blew passed him, he heard the girls that were with him squeak in fright as they passed over head, one of them raised her rifle to shoot, but Mu piped up, before hand "Easy girls, they're friends, I think."

Director Azrael stood to his feet, these white craft, they weren't Orb machines and they were making a mockery of daggers that tried to shoot at them, he was hearing the screams of the pilots as they were being gunned down, he was shaking in fury, some new ZAFT units, they had to be.

Dagger team Cassious, were trying to take cover from two of those fighters, just two of them had his four man team pinned down, he cursed at being placed between a rock, and a hard place to be, he knew his orders we to push forward, but every time they sent a unit out, it was cut to ribbons by those things.

Then it happened, he looked up, as one of them climbed above them, and changed shape, "I don't know if this is getting through or not, but they are mobile suits! I repeat they are mobile suites! I've never seen anything like them"

Jolly Roger 04 had gone to soldier mode, and aimed his gun pod down at the units, and pulled the trigger, the whine of the rail gun letting fly it's shower of deadly spikes, rained down on his pray.

The three remaining daggers of that team watched as their leader was gunned down, by the one machine, before it came to sand on the ground in front of them, and changed again to be a hybrid mode, between mobile suit and jet fighter, they saw the pilot, they could see the smile on his face, as he fired twelve missiles at them, before taking off again, in it's jet form. Leaving behind twisted blackened metal in his wake, to join up with his teammate.

As the Arc-Angel was launched, Alexander saw it, and rallied his team to fallow it, he heard cries of protest, but they broke from combat to fallow that ship into space.

Once the Arc-Angel was in space, they saw a ship, that didn't look like anything they had seen before, it looked as though it belonged in an ocean, then it hit Murrue, she had seen a ship like that before, in a picture…

"Captain, I'm detecting multiple heat sources being launched from that ship, the thermal patterns look like the Typhoon… make that 24 Typhoons and 12 unknowns."

She turned to look at Sai, as he said that, and then added, "Another 12 Typhoons approaching at high speed, for behind us, they'll over take us in three seconds."

Not long after he had said those words, 11 Typhoons shot passed them, the 12th one, turned, and shifted to its soldier mode, and saluted them, before changing back to Jet configuration.

"Jolly Roger team, head for home, and let the Captain know, I'll be over later, and to prepare for guests… also have a shuttle sent to that ship we just passed, I'm going to land on it, and say hello to some people. I'll see you all later, Reaper out." He said, as he turned his fighter around, lined up on the port side leg, and opened a channel to the Arc-Angel.

Miriallia smiled, and handed the headset to her Captain, "He wants to know if he can land or not."

Murrue took the headset, and placed it to her ear, and happily spoke into it, "Welcome home, I'll see you in a minuet." With that she took off the ear peace, and headed off to the hanger.

He taxied into the hanger, and undid his straps, looking at them floating; he opened the cockpit, to see a woman with chocolate brown hair, floating towards him, a smile on her face, and tears floating away. He pushed himself from the cockpit, to grab hold of her, and spin with her, in the air, and middle of the hanger, "Sorry I took so long, but I was able to bring some major help."

She wrapped her arms under his, and onto his shoulders, well tucking her face into his right shoulder, "Jerk, making me wait like that, all so you could look the part of the hero."

He kissed the top of her head, and rested his left cheek against her hair, as they slowly floated to a walkway. He spoke, "I've got a meeting set up between the Arc-Angle and the Victoria, please be respectful to the Captain and the X.O. of the Victoria, it's more important then you know."

She smiled at him, and nodded, before adding, "I think we should wait till the Kusanagi is ready as well, Princess Cagalli will be on that ship, I'm sure she would like to take part in that meeting. You do remember her right? She was the girl that tagged along with us, in the desert."

"I remember, just try to get her over there, soon, a shuttle launch from the Victoria will be here soon, I'll see you on the Victoria, and don't forget your senior staff, as well." He kissed her, before floating off to his Typhoon, and launching again.

Three hours came and went, before the shuttle had returned to it's hanger, the ships company had been placed on parade status, they were grouped by uniform and station, every start of a new position was marked by a white uniform, there were red uniforms, blue uniforms, black and white ones, as well as pure black ones. Each uniform was classed as a dress uniform.

The shuttle stooped on an inlaid U.N. Spacy insignia, as the ladder was brought over to the main door of the shutter as it opened, everyone on display snapped to attention, well the first person descended the stairs. She was still young, her blond hair cut short, she wore a white uniform, which was highly embellished, the next person out of the door, was tall, with also with blond hair, he wore his uniform lose, like he always did, his cap looked as if it really didn't belong on his head, his uniform was grey in colour.

Fallowing behind those two, was a woman, whom most would conceder pretty, she too wore a grey uniform, that hardly did her any justice, her hair was a dark brown, almost chocolate, she brushed a stray peace of hair behind her ear, as she walked down, to join everyone at the bottom of the stairs, the last one out of the shuttle was a boy, no, a young man, the look in his eyes that's what made the difference, with brown hair, and violate eyes, seeing the boy, one of the three officers in white, at the head of the ship's company, fought the urge to run up to the young man.

The Captain of the Victoria took a steep forward, saluted the four people before him, and then said, "I am Captain Benjamin Kross, welcome aboard CVS-702, the Victoria." He gave them a good looking over, and remarked to himself how many of these people were still just kids themselves. "If you would please fallow my Executive officer, she will show you to the dinning hall, where we will discus maters."

Murrue looked at the older man, she could've sworn she saw him wink at her, he had the same green eyes as Alexander, but he was so much older, easily into his Fifties, if not older. As they filed passed, she saw Alexander, standing with the other pilots, at least she figured they were pilots, since they had the same uniform that Alexander used to have.

It was in the dinning hall, when Kira felt it, an arm come around to put him in a head lock, as someone started to ruffle his hair, his voice was so comforting to hear, "Glad to see you made it kid, I thought you were dead for sure, but I couldn't find any trace of you, so I thought that the blast had…" he trailed off.

"That's okay, Commander Kross, It's good to see you too, and I know that Miss Murrue will be much happier now, that you are around." Said the boy, as he got free, he looked around the dinning hall, this was a special room he figured, unlike the rest of this ship, this room seemed to be made of wood, or looked like it, the lighting was much softer, and it felt more warm and inviting.

"I see you are well acquainted with some of these people, Alexander." Said that woman with the red eyes, as she took a seat.

He nodded to her, as he pulled out a chair for Murrue, near the end of the table "If you would please Murrue?" he asked in a soft voice, smiling at her.

Murrue, slid her hands behind her back, as she sat, bringing her skirt close to her legs, and sat with her knees together, once Alexander pushed her seat in, she looked up to him, and smiled sweetly, "I missed you Alex." Was said in her eyes, unspoken, as she looked back to the older woman sitting across from her, her red eyes seemed to pierce into Murrue.

Everyone had taken a seat, it was the Captain of the Victoria that spoke first, "Well let's just skip all the formalities; I never really liked having them, in an atmosphere like this."

"Excuse me, Captain Kross?" came Murrue's voice, so soft, it was almost missed, to her surprise, she heard in stereo "Yes?" from both of the men in white uniforms, she looked to Alexander, to watch his eyes flash to his shoulder, it took a moment for it to sink in, and she saw it, there was another thick stripe on his shoulder, bringing the number to four, she looked over to the shoulders of the older man, that she wanted to address and counted four stripes as well, "May I call you Benjamin? It would make this go much more smoothly…"

The older man dipped his head, "I have a feeling I know what is on your mind, and the answer is yes, myself and Alexander are related, he is my boy. And before you ask again, it isn't that uncommon on U.N. Spacy craft for a second or third generation be serving together on the same ship."

_Is this what he meant, by 'it's more important then you know…?' Jerk. _She thought to herself, as she looked to Alexander, all he had on his face, was a bit of a sheepish smile, well trying to avoid eye contact with her, inwardly she sighed.

"Captain Benjamin, Thank you for you assistance with buying time for the Arc-Angel and the Kusanagi, to escape to space. The timely arrival of your forces caused enough confusion in the Atlantic Federation's forces, to buy us time, that we desperately needed." Spoke Cagalli, as she tightened her fists on her white pants, well staring at the table.

The older man just made a waving motion with his right hand, as he responded with, "It was Alexander's plan, and he said that he felt the need to go down there, to find someone that is important to him, to know if they were alright… And I'm not about to send him down there alone, not that Jolly Roger Squadron would've let me, in the first place. Ever since he went on this little vacation, this ship's been a mess, with out the Commander Air Group."

The woman with the red eyes laughed a little, before surveying the group, "Well, I think you should all introduce yourselves… I'm Commander Celica Kross… yes I'm married to the captain, yes Alexander is my son, and yes, I am not human. My race is called the Meltrandi."

This was the first time, most of the people in the room had seen an alien, it was subtle, but her ears were slightly pointed, almost elf like.

"I'm Cagalli Yula Athha, princess of Orb…" said the blond girl, looking up from the table.

"Kira Yamato, I pilot the Freedom, I'm trying to bring an end to this war." Spoke the brown haired young man.

"Mu La Flaga, I used to pilot mobile armours, but now I pilot mobile suites." Said the blond man, taking his cap off, and placing it in his lap.

"Murrue Ramius, I the Captain of the Arc-Angel…" she trailed off, as she fidgeted with her hands in her lap, not sure what to do, these two older officers, both had 'his' cool, and collected attitudes, though Celica, was almost icy, like she felt like she had something to prove to everyone in the room, she looked to Alexander for some sense of what to do, and she felt his hand squeeze hers.

"Captain Alexander Kross, call sign Reaper, I'm the Commander Air Group of the Uraga class carrier, Victoria. But you all knew that already." He flashed a confident smile, as he squeezed Murrue's hands a little tighter.

"And here we are, back to me, Miss Athha, based on what Alexander has told me, of the state of affairs here, I place the Victoria and all of her fighting strength at your disposal. We will need supplies, and support, and I cannot think of a better place to ally ourselves with, you want peace, and our role is that of peace keepers, I think we shall find that we go well hand in hand." Finished Captain Benjamin, just as the food arrived.

The Dinner was a quite affair, not much being said, by either sides present at the table, though, from the point of view of the people native to this world, those from this ship were giving a show of strength, even if was only over something as simple as dinner, on a ship with gravity in all sections, but it would the events that happened after the dinner, that would seal the deal, between the forces present.

"And here we are, on the main hanger deck, please stay behind the yellow lines; it's for your own safety. This ship is still on combat alert, and we have craft being moved to launching positions, as well as craft returning from patrol." Spoke Alexander, as he opened the large heavy blast door, which would take everyone into the main fighter hanger.

The doors opened, and with it, came the smell of fuels, oils, and heated rubber, along with the whine of turbines shutting down, and starting up. Running about the deck, ducking around Typhoons, were people in brown, red, purple, blue and green jumpsuits, moving missiles, or inspecting the craft, or in the case of those in the red jumpsuits they were taking a lift up to the flight deck.

"Granted the Victoria maintains 60 Typhoons along with 36 Spectre class bombers, down here you will never find more than 36 Typhoons, at any given time. There is always one squadron in the area around the ship, performing patrols, well a second squadron is held on standby, to provide support. On the hanger deck below this one, is where the Spectres class bomber are found." Continued Alexander as he led them around the deck, it was Murrue, that pointed to the white Typhoon that was being held in the air, by a large crane, "And what is going on there?"

It took him a moment, till he read the number on the side of the plane, then seeing the starboard landing gear had been pulled, "That'd be mine, guess my plane captain felt the need to pull the landing gear, which was damaged, when I had that rough landing on the Arc-Angel..."

"Darn right I did Captain, I told you, she might love you enough to let you push her so hard, but that was a little much! You really shouldn't have been flying like that, it was luck, that you didn't kill yourself on the next tack off, or landing, the second I had her in the air, the landing gear fell right off." A soft voice came from behind the group. She led a group of green jumpsuits that were bringing a tractor with a new peace of landing gear on it, over to the Typhoon.

She stopped and blushed a little when she realized that Alexander was leading a group through the hanger, she started to back pedal, "I'm sorry Sir, and I didn't realize you were giving a tour..."

Alexander smirked a little, before speaking, "This would be my plane captain, the wonderfully spirited Chief Petty Officer Sarah Jones, her job, is to make sure, that my Typhoon is ready for action, she over sees any maintenance that needs doing, as well as giving me a hard time, when I bring my plane back a little banged up."

Sarah started to fidget with her hands a little before she spoke, "Well it's just your Typhoon, likes to be going fast, and pushing herself to her limits, and when she can't she can be a lot of trouble for maintenance... If you'll excuse us sir, we've got to get her ready, before your squadron is rotated up, for patrol."

"Well, in that case, shall we continue to another part of the ship?" Asked Alexander, leading the group out of the hanger.

A few days had passed, since the tour of the Victoria, Murrue had come back over, to spend some time with Alexander, mostly talking, as it was something that neither of them, had much of a chance to do, since the escape from Orb for the Arc-Angel, in that time, Kira had taken the Freedom out to escort his friend back to PLANT, and had yet to return.

"Jerk, you could've told me, that the ship's commanding officers were your parents... But This ship is really amazing..." she trailed off, as one of the Typhoons, this one was green where Alexander's was white, and blue where it was yellow, on its tails was a black diamond with a red outline, flared it's engines, the three fins that were spaced evenly around the outside of the engine were as wide open as they could be, as the blue-white fire, became a cone with blue white diamonds in it, slammed against the blast ramps that came up behind it, the force of the engines, pushed the ramps slightly down, as the craft rocketed off into space.

He shrugged, and looked over the flight deck, from the observation post; they had a great view of everything that was taking place below them, "Your right, I probably should've, but I've had a lot on my mind, since I got back here. Finding out, that before I even left this ship some five months ago, I had been promoted to the rank of Captain, and the real reason why I was going to Terra, was to assume command of my own ship, probably a frigate, maybe even a destroyer. And yet," he reached over, and squeezed her left hand, "what was most on my mind, was you. The weeks I spent out, in orbit, I kept thinking about you, wanting to know what was going on in your life... and when I heard about Alaska, well I thought I'd lost you, because I felt like I didn't really belong in this world."

"What do you mean, feeling like you don't belong in this world?" her eyes and gone from being a little hard, to being soft and carrying.

"Think about it, my entire life, has been spent in space, except for when we were at Orb that was the first time, my feet actually touched a planet, and I'd been on them before in the fighters I've flown over the years. I even find myself without a direction anymore, I just don't know what to expect for the future, though I'd like to try and build one," he looked to her, and gave her hand a pat, "with you."

Everything slowed down for her, was this, what she wanted? Was it even right? Could she think of a life after this war? Could she even be allowed to dream a little, and hope for the best? Her mind raced with possibilities, she smiled, a sad one, she could never go home again, she'd be tried as a traitor, because she didn't die like a good soldier at Alaska, but it was a simple question that she asked, to see where it would lead, "Where would we go?"

His response was simple, just three little letters, "Orb."

Her eyes showed all the feelings that she'd been locking away, since this war started, since 'he' was taken away from her, "Do you mean it?"

"I do, I was thinking a little house on the beach, with a white fence, maybe a dog..." he was allowing himself to dream a little.

She leaned against him, and smiled, "You're forgiven, for letting my walk into meeting your parents blind like that. But let's just get through this war first, I know the real battles are just about to start... and you guys did use nuclear weapons on the Atlantic Federation..."

"I've already talked to the other senior officers, we are going to be using the big guns so to speak, and every craft for the space battles are going to be loaded with reactive missiles. We are going to bring peace, we'd rather not use weapons like this, they are meant as a final word, used to end a war, before it gets out of hand, or bring one that has gotten out of hand, under control." He was leaning against the window, looking back across the deck.

She nodded quietly, and looked out to the port side of the Victoria, where the Arc-Angel was, the ships were close in size, though the Victoria was the larger of the two, she found it amazing, that this ship though actually much older than the Arc-Angel, was so much more advanced than her ship, and it was state of the art for the Earth Alliance, and that was when the call came over the speakers, "All hands to battle stations, repeat all hands to battle stations, all Typhoon pilots, scramble, repeat scramble!"

The lighting started to pulse red and white, she felt a quick hug, and he was gone, sprinting out of sight, she tried to fallow, but was greeted by a pair of men flanking Commander Celica in white body armour, were standing at the door, the older woman spoke, "Captain Ramius, would you care to join us on the bridge? I'm sure you would like firsthand information. Fallow me, if you would please."

As they entered the bridge, Murrue, found it interesting, to see and hear all the communications that were going on, to her left, upon entering, was a massive RADAR display, and on the very edge of it, she could see, several contacts, one blue, labelled 'Freedom', a large yellow one, labelled 'Unknown 01', both were engaged by many red blips labelled 'GINN'.

"Wolf squadron and Jolly Roger squadron, head to coordinates delta 7, and support unit 'Freedom' it is heavily engaged, do not fire unless fired upon." Thos were the words coming from a woman manning a position in the CIC, as she continued "Phoenix, Diamondback, and Stinger squadrons. You are assigned to intercept roles, you are free to engage, any craft that violates the 400km red zone around the Victoria."

Murrue watched as 24 blue blips on the RADAR started to move towards the Freedom, but her eyes were on the one, that was tagged 'Jolly Roger 01'.

"It'll be almost ten minutes before they are in range to provide any kind of support, why not take a seat?" spoke Captain Benjamin, from his large chair in the center of the room to Murrue.

Aboard the pink ship, once the attackers had been driven off Kira found himself on the bridge, as the person on the target identification position yelled out, "Captain! 24 craft approaching, thermal patterns call them out as a unit codenamed 'Flanker', what should we do?"

The Scared, one armed man, looked to the young woman with pink hair, flanked by two young men, as he winced, he'd fought against one of those craft before, in the desert of northern Africa, and just one had been able to prove to be a difficult, "Damn those Earth Forces, have they already managed to press them inter service? I thought they were still prototypes..."

Kira floated over to the sensor display, and brought up the profile, of the craft, once seeing it, he smiled, and sighed somewhat, "Captain Waltfeld, they are not going to be a problem, they were probably launched to investigate. They are friendly though."

Well that would be part four, I appreciate you reading this far, should you have any thoughts please post them, and I will do my best to address them. My time is a bit more in demand now, that I'm off vacation, and back to work.


	5. Chapter 5

To the end of the stars

A/N:

Amir-015,

I'm fully aware of what would happen, if the Macross universe and that of the Gundam Seed universe would run into each other. That is why, the _only_ capital ship, I am intending to have come over, is the Victoria, and even then, it is just a carrier, it's not even a Battle-class carrier, so it's not fitted with a Macross type cannon. Also, the Victoria wasn't part of the 21st fleet, so my story has very little to even do with frontiers, the only thing that I'm pulling from that, is Sheryl Nome and in that case, anything to do with here only going to appear a few times, mostly referencing a song or two, and nothing else. As I've said several times, my VF-27 Typhoon, has nothing to do with the VF-27 from Frontiers.

I'll try to space things out a bit more, and try to give more detail, as to the happenings, I'll be dealing with what happened to Orb, in this chapter, so don't worry.

CyberAngelOne,

I chose to go with a Uraga class, as they are actually very large at 550 meters, a modern carrier like the Nimitz class, are 317 meters in length, however the Uraga class lack the main gun of a Battle type, also known as the New Macross class Colonization ships, as I really didn't want to give the people from Macross to have a ship, packing that kind of punch.

Anyways, on with the show!

* * *

"So what are they called again, Kira?" asked the girl with the pink hair, on the bridge of her ship, well looking out the main view ports, at the blue white spheres of light, that were flanked around the bridge.

"The fighters or the group?" asked the boy with brown hair, and violate eyes, looking in the same direction.

"Both, if you don't mind, I'm still trying to get an understanding of it too." said the scared man, in the dark blue over-coat, as he spun his chair around, to look at the two of them.

"The fighters are called Typhoons, not 'Flankers' they are the main interceptor, and superiority craft, of a group called U.N. Spacy, they are a military branch of a government that spans half the galaxy, well, in their reality anyways. And that's where things start to sound like a piece of bad science fiction... That group as they say have a drive system, which lets them, jump between star systems, by folding space, and having a ship travel in a dimensional pocket. Problem is, it's not perfect, and they can get lost, during that trip, going to other places, times or even realities." Said Kira, as he moved over to the glass, and turning to smile at the girl with pink hair.

"So that white one, out there, right in front of us, that one is flown by that blond man, with the green eyes Kira?" asked the pink haired girl, as she left her chair to stand beside him.

"Yes, that one is flown by Captain Kross, you'd like him Lacus, he's a nice person, when he's not fighting, and Miss Murrue, seems to like him as well. And you fought against him too, both of you Captain Waltfeld and you too Athrun. Since the Victoria showed up, he's been very busy with trying to get an alliance between that ship, the Arc-Angel, and the ship launched by Orb, and I guess the 'Eternal' as well, since I am sure, we are all going to be fighting for the same thing." Said the boy with brown hair, as he turned to look out the window, to see the blinking red and green lights off in the distance.

"Captain Benjamin, I wanted to thank you in person, for sending a squadron of your bombers down to Orb, to assist in the defence of my nation, I understand that they are not as high performance as the Typhoons, but their presence will make the Atlantic Federation think twice about approaching our waters again." Said the blond girl, as she stood in the captain's cabin, aboard the Victoria.

The older man, placed his cap on his desk, and took off his white gloves, well he responded to her, "Princess, that is no problem, once Jolly Roger and Wolf squadrons are back, from escorting that ship, I'll have the Diamondbacks head down to join them, that way, there will be a Typhoon and Spectre squadron present. I know that it's not much, but it is all that the Victoria can really spare, but with the support of the Arc-Angel and the Kusanagi, we should be alright, even down two squadrons."

A knock at the door came, that drew the attention of everyone in the room, as the door opened, with a lieutenant, that entered the room, saluted, then informed them, that the two squadrons and the unknown ship were approaching.

Those on the bridge of the pink ship, known as the Eternal, were standing at the windows at the sight of the CVS-702 Victoria, they couldn't believe it, it looked like it should be in an ocean, it looked some-what like a pair of old Nimitz class aircraft carriers that were used by the old nation of the United States of America, before they became the Atlantic Federation, were fused together, to create a double hulled ship.

Their escorting craft had broken away, and were with precision of years of practice were landing on that ship, Andrew Waltfeld, was very interested in this, he'd seen the Typhoons before, even fought against one of them in the desert, he watched as a pair of green Typhoons were escorting a shuttle that was a bright white, with its engines mounted on top of the craft, a bright red circle with a white diamond in the center was easy to see on the hull and wings, as well as the words 'U.N. Spacy' and 'CVS-702 Victoria' stencilled on the side of the hull and tail fin of the craft, approached the Eternal.

"Second time this month that we've got to be on parade stance, for visitors... I wonder how many times we're going to have to do this." Said one of the men, in a black and white uniform standing in the main shuttle hanger of the Victoria, behind, two officers in white uniforms, with tall hats, as the shuttle came to a halt on the large U.N. Spacy insignia on the deck.

The scared man, in the blue long coat was the first one on the stair way, he was impressed, this ship had gravity, in its hanger, they had even gone as far as to have some of the ship's company on display for their arrival, as he descended the stairs, he noticed as they all came to attention, and saluted, once he reached the bottom, a man in his fifties, maybe even late fifties, steeped forward, saluted, then spoke, "I am Captain Benjamin Kross, commanding officer of the U.N.S. Victoria, welcome aboard, there is going to be much to talk about."

The scared man, saluted back, and felt the need to pose a question, "Greetings, I am Captain Andrew Waltfeld, captain of the Eternal, I do have a question for you though, would you be the one that lead those Flan... I mean Typhoons?"

The older man smiled, and shook his head, before responding, "No, that would be my Commander Air Group, and my son. He's the one in white, with the rest of the pilots; they are the ones in the black and white uniforms."

With that, Andrew Waltfeld and the pink haired girl were taken to the main meeting hall of the Victoria, to have a very long and important discussion with the other members of what was being kicked around as the 'Free ships alliance'.

Several days had come and gone, now four ships sat inside of one of the colonies of the L4 point, out in the debris of the area, a white craft, with two out board engines, and a long narrow body, it's wings were reverse swept, a large tall tail on the back, between the two body mounted engines, and a large disk sat a top of the craft, slowing rotating around, scanning the area, when it picked up a ship, that was slowly entering the area, it was reported back to its command ship in seconds.

On the bridge of her new warship Lieutenant Commander Natarle Badgirule, sat, looking at the space station, that was on her screen at it the maximum magnification, to her left was a man that she cared very little for, she found his attitude and presence distasteful. She knew her orders capture or destroy the Arc-Angel, she didn't need this person watching over her, but there was little she could do, she had been ordered to bring Director Azrael with her.

"Captain, four ships detected in the colony. Three unknowns, and the Arc-Angel, one of the unknowns are already moving out, and its launching small craft. They're not in the library." Spoke her weapons officer, as he read the incoming data.

"I want a visual image of those craft, and I want it now." She barked out the order, as she fixed her eyes on the screen.

It took a few minutes, and then she saw it, those sleek profiles, with the massively large intakes, the almost triangular wings, though she noticed several colours, not just white, black and yellow ones, there was a lot of them this time, behind them though, were other craft, that she hadn't seen before, they had massive engines, like the ones she knew, but bodies of these ones were less sleek, almost box like, but that was when she saw them, under the wings of the ones in the back, large missiles, she'd seen missiles like those before, on 'his' fighter.

Azrael saw them too, his eyes narrowed, it was those white ones, that denied his forces victory at Orb, they had come out of the sky, like the hand of God, and struck his fleet with the wrath of the heavens, just 12 of them that time, but this time, he could count almost 40 of them, and they had other ones behind them, and they had more of those big missiles, that had shattered his fleet.

Natarle stood, and took the radio, once she saw the Arc-Angel leave the port, "Captain Ramius, I wish that we didn't have to meet again, under these circumstances, but I see that you've made friends, and brought them to this fight."

The woman on the other end of the communications gave a soft, almost sad smile, before she said, "I'm sorry Natarle, but we can't let you take us back to the Earth Forces, we've serious reservations about what is going on, but if you fight us here, it won't just be the Arc-Angel you are fighting, but also the Victoria. You know what the Typhoon is capable of, this time; there are thirty six of them and several Spectre bombers, which will attack, if you press this battle Natarle, all of them are just as well trained as Alexander is."

Natarle clenched her teeth, before closing the communications, and looking to her crew, "We are retreating from this area."

The man in the blue suit looked at her, his eyes full of fire, before he could say a word, she looked at him, and said "I'm not going to send this ship, into a battle, that we cannot win, even with the three machines you brought with you, we might sink the Arc-Angel, but those fifty fighters out there, would sink us. We will fall back and bide our time."

As the Typhoons and Spectres landed back on the Victoria, the Captain of the ship transmitted a message to the rest of the fleet that they were going to head out from here and link up, with the rest of the ships at a later date, claiming that they needed to support the Orb forces from orbit, as they came under attack from the Atlantic Federation for a second time.

It'd been weeks for them, since they last spoke to each other on the observation deck of the Victoria, they missed one another greatly, they were floating in her cabin, aboard her ship, just holding one another, she was the first to speak, "This is going to get worse, before things get better. But when this is over, I'd like to have that."

It took him a moment to remember, what she was talking about, and it came to him, all those weeks ago. Standing on the observation deck, talking about maybe having a little house on a beach, he smiled, "I'm getting tired of fighting, and I just want a nice quite life now. If only we had the 8th colony fleet, Battle 8 would make short work of both sides, just one shot from the main gun, would wipe out both sides. Then it'd all be over, and we could just be happy, in peace." He finished by kissing the top of her head.

She smiled, and snuggled closer to him, she enjoyed the closeness, for a little while, they could forget about the war going on, that was starting to get out of hand. The fight against the Dominion had been hard, but she had been grateful, that the first possible battle had been avoided, if for no other reason, then Natarle had the good sense to avoid fighting a battle that would've cost her and her ship everything. "Alex, thank you. I never got a chance to say that to you, for running Natarle off, at L4, the presence of the Victoria made the difference there, but I understand why you had to move to support Orb, if we lost Orb, we'd be in really bad shape." She smiled as they bumped off the wall.

"I hear that the last engagement you were in was really rough, for Kira. Still," he broke mid sentence to kiss her, "I'm glad you were able to make it through it. I'd hate to be trying to go after Natarle... I know that myself and her, didn't always see eye to eye, doesn't mean that I'd hate to have to turn my guns on her though. Since both of you, were such huge helps to me, when I first got here."

There closeness was interrupted by a message from the bridge, claiming that Boaz had been destroyed by nuclear fire, Alexander felt Murrue's hands tighten on his chest, at the news, he held her tighter, and whispered into her hair, "Don't worry, we will bring an end to this war. And then, we can just stand on a beach, and look up at the stars."

The battle was a desperate one, the Earth Forces had taken a horrible loss, from the super weapon known as GENISIS, more than half their fighting strength in space, had been wiped out, they now fought to try and stop the weapon from firing again. Most of ZAFT fought to keep the Earth Forces from the weapon, well some fought with the Free Ships alliance, to bring an end to the fighting.

The Victoria stood at the far side of the engagement, flinging anti-ship missiles at various targets, well two squadrons kept it safe from harm. The Arc-Angel was locked in a duel with the Dominion, well the Eternal and the Kusanagi fought to the center.

The Freedom was locked in a duel with a machine known as the Providence, the Justice and the Strike Rouge were fighting their way to the command center of ZAFT. Jolly Roger and Wolf squadrons were engaging GINN's and Dagger, holding their own, but taking damage to the Typhoons, the Strike had been damaged and started to returned to the Arc-Angel, when fate would place it, between both capital ships as the main beam was fired, he saved the ship, but at what cost?

Alexander had just gunned down a blue mobile suit, he saw it out of the corner of his eyes, a bright flash of light, he'd seen those guns before, it was from that black ship, that looked like the Arc-Angel, they had missed the bridge of the Arc-Angel only barely, he grunted as he brought his Typhoon around, armed all his missiles, and started to target several positions on the black ship, when his computer told him, that all missiles were locked on, he pressed the button.

Several doors opened on the Typhoon, to revel many missiles, the force from the missiles launching as one, pushed the fighter backwards, the Dominion's CIWS did it's level best to shoot them all down, but enough of them had gotten through, the CIWS had engaged the missiles that were going for more critical targets, but one by one, the missiles stripped the warship of its defences, and that was when he took his chance. Alexander flew directly at the bridge, changing into the soldier configuration; he placed his gun-pod right up against the glass, well holding onto the ship with the other hand.

It was in that second, before the blue-white flash, that Director Azrael, and a wounded Natarle Badgirule, both had their lives flash before their eyes, for them it was over in an instant, the blue white beam ripped through the glass, their bodies, and back out the rear bulkhead of the ship, all that was left as the atmosphere left the ship was a crackling sound as the energy that had been released from the weapon, filled the area with a static charge.

The fighter pushed off the ship, changed mode into a jet again, launched vertical, then flipped around, and let fly one missile, it ripped through the black ship, like it wasn't even part of reality, before the ship was torn apart in nuclear fire.

Murrue felt the pain of losing a friend, when the Strike exploded, but he'd saved them all, she was in a state of shock, when she saw what one of the Typhoons had done to the Dominion, but for them, they were out of the fight.

The battle raged, and raged, many people would lose their lives in what could almost be called a pointless battle, when the final gun was silenced, the victors, was no one, how can you really call it victory with such a loss of life?

In the aftermath of the battle, the Eternal slipped off into space, well the Victoria, Arc-Angel, and Kusanagi returned to earth, to Orb. The Kusanagi stayed in orbit, well the other two descended to the surface of the world.

Once the two ships had reached Orb, the Arc-Angel was placed in a docking bay, underwater; well the Victoria was stashed away, in side of a cliff face. It would be over a year, before those two ships would see the light of day again.

Once the ships had been tucked away, safely, the ruling family of Orb, the Autha's meet with the crew of both ships, with a gift, a home, in a place of their choosing, those of the Victoria, were also gifted with clothing, and jobs with the Orb military, to help easy their transition into the new world that they found themselves in, though some homes had to be built, those that did, the people stayed aboard ship, till the home was built for them. Alexander and Murrue were two such people that had to wait, but fortunately it wasn't too long for them, and before long, they were moving into a cozy little place on the southern coast of the main island of Orb.

They flopped down on a small red couch, in the middle of the room, both of them breathing heavily, and sweating, "Was that the last of your boxes?" she asked him, they'd been going back and forth to a sheltered cave, that held inside of it, a large ship.

He nodded to her, "Yup, now we just have to get everything put away, and not piled into groups in each room." He placed an arm around her waist, and pulled her close.

She smiled; it was nice to just have a place, that wasn't a warship, trying to look like a room. She snuggled close to him, and shut her eyes for a little while; they'd been working hard all day, starting a life away from war, "It's going to be interesting to say the least, but let's see about getting some take out, I'm kind of hungry."

"It's been nice, just being here, I am so glad that the Autha's were able to give us this place..." she said, looking up at the sky, in all of it blues, reds and pinks of the setting sun.

"I know what you mean, but I think we're both going to have to start looking for jobs, not that I don't enjoy spending my days and night with you," he kissed her forehead, "But we can only live so long on this allowance we've been given for all that we did during the war. And I know about the offer from Morgenroete, I think you should take it. Cagalli said that she'd pull some strings, try to get me a position in the Orb military, I'm no engineer..."

She smiled, well playfully pushing the take-out container with her left foot, "I didn't think you read the mail... But being an engineer again, would be nice, not having to think about life and death situations every day of my life, that's something I don't miss for a heartbeat. In a way, I'm glad that it happened, but in a way, I wish that the war never occurred at all. If it didn't we never would've met, and I wouldn't have this right now, and I wouldn't want to trade this, at all. But there are things, which I wish I could still do, that I can't now."

Sensing her sadness, he looked at her, and playfully tapped her on the nose, "like?"

"Like going to my parent's house, for dinner every now and then, mostly when I blew my food budget on things, like clothing, or books..." she stuck her tong out playfully, well rolling her eyes, a little, it was nice to be herself again, not having to try and be a mature captain, that was the pillar of strength for the entire ship.

"Who says you can't do that now?" he asked her, as he pulled her closer.

"The Atlantic Federation, declaring me a traitor, if we were to go there, they'd arrest us before we got off the plane..." she was honestly sad at this point, ever since the war started, she hadn't had a chance to tell her family how she was doing, probably the first news that they had on her, was after Alaska, where they would've been told that she was killed in action.

"So? I've got a heavily armed, and armoured machine at my disposal, I'd like to see them try and stop it. If you'd like to go, we can, I'll just fly us low, and not too fast... the cockpit is small, I know I wouldn't mind you on my lap. I mean if I push it I could get us to the western shore of the Atlantic Federation in just over an hour..." He winked and kissed her left cheek.

She blinked at that, "You do know that's over 7200 km away right?" then the logical part of her mind clicked in, "Just how fast is a Typhoon, you never actually told me, and the data never actually had it..."

He smiled, before answering, "Below 10,000m the top speed would be 7050 km/h. or mach 6.56, with full after burners going, but at that kind of speed, even at 10km up, that's not a lot of room, encase anything goes wrong."

"Wow, I knew it could do more than six and a half times the speed of sound, we found that our when you got the engine replaced, but it's another thing to hear it in kilometres per hour. Would you mind going there with me? I'd like to see my parents, it's been almost a year, since I saw them last, and I kind of miss them." She leaned her head against his chest.

She squeaked as he playfully swatted her bottom, before saying, "We'll go in the morning."

She exited the change room, in flight gear, it hugged her curves so very well, she felt a little self conscious, even more so, when he smiled at her, a slight blush came to her face, when he knelt in front of her, and placed his hands around a very sensitive area, pulling on some straps, and buckles, she winced, "Never had to wear something like this before huh?" he asked her, making sure everything was on right.

"Careful! You know how sensitive I am there." She was slightly pinker, realising that she had just said that out loud, she lifted her helmet to hide her face, somewhat embarrassed, regardless of the fact that the hanger was empty.

He just smiled, climbed up into the cockpit, she fallowed, and he helped her into it, as she sat across his lap, she noticed how cramped it was, and all the different controls, as the cockpit closed, and power came on, she was surprised to see the cockpit all but vanish, she looked down, and could see the ground, across from her, was the hanger wall, behind him, was the tails, but nothing below where the canopy met the fuselage, "Where did it all go?" she asked.

"It's all done by cameras and screens; this system was first used in the VF-19 Excalibur, it gives us almost unmatched visibility, and awareness of what's around us." He said, as he brought the main engines on line, the hanger door was open.

The white, black and yellow craft taxied about on the runway, as the pilot called to the tower, "Jolly Roger 01, requesting clearance for takeoff."

"Jolly Roger 01, proceed to runway 07, you will be cleared for takeoff, after the heavy lift transport has landed." Came back the air traffic controller's voice.

It wasn't long before they were in the air, Murrue pushed herself as close to Alexander as she could, as she watched him, let go of the throttle type something in on the key pad, hit enter, then push the throttle passed '100' and into the '150' range, as he did that, she noticed his pinkie and thumb press two buttons on it, then it hit her, the acceleration, it was like a sledge hammer had just hit her in the chest, it took a lot of strength to turn her head, as she did so, she saw the column of water shooting into the air behind them, they were barely 30m above the water, and the water behind them, was shooting up, into the sky behind them, she looked down, and it was like seeing a wake from a boat.

She turned her head to look at the head's up display, she noticed it was getting easier to move around now, she watched the numbers on the left side of it were approaching 7,000, and the one on the right, was staying at 30, , she also noticed in the center top was a compass and in the middle seemed to be a little pair of wings, with zeros on either side, above them about half way up, was a solid line, and at the top, just below the compass was another solid line, with a ten on either side of it, below the wings were broken lines, just like the solid ones.

"So where exactly are we going?" came his voice over the intercom.

"San Diego, California. I'll have to look them up in a phone book afterwards, they might've moved." She said back to him, as she moved around to get a little more comfortable, in the glass of his helmet, she noticed that his eyes were hardly even blinking, let alone moving, she also saw the reflection of everything that they were flying past, not that there was much to see.

It had taken just over an hour, before they were over land, he had to slow down, drastically, and he managed to find a safe place to put down, in GERWALK mode, and opened the cockpit to let her out.

They stood at a telephone booth, it was about mid day still, and she was flipping through a phone book, running her hands down the list of names, till she found what she was looking for, and looked up on the map, point where they are, and to where they are going.

She was working in her garden, it was fall, and she was trimming her flowers, thinking about her daughter, whom as far as she knew, wouldn't be able to smell flowers again, she found that somewhat heart braking, even after all this time.

But it was the howl above her, and the wind that drew her attention up, to the strange machine that was landing in her back yard, it was white, with black and yellow markings, it kind of looked like someone put a man and a jet together, she felt a bit of fear when she saw that it had a big gun in one hand. As it touched the soft soil, it sank in a little, the nose of the craft came down to almost touch the ground, it's canopy opened and she saw two people sitting in it, she gripped her pruning shears a little tighter, as one of them took her helmet off, she dropped her shears, and ran over to the two people in the craft, crying.

Murrue hugged the older woman tightly, both of them now crying, Alexander had taken his helmet off, and slid out of the Typhoon, and leaned against it.

"Hi mom, I'm home." Was all Murrue said, as the older woman, slowly let go of her daughter, to wipe the tears away from her blue eyes.

"They told us you were dead, how?" her thoughts weren't together; she had so many questions for her little girl.

"Maybe we should go inside; I'll answer what I can." Said Murrue as they all walked into the two story home.

"Timothy, get your feet of the couch!" Barked the older woman, at her brown haired son, whom was clearly still a teenager, the boy poked his head over the couch to see his older sister, and someone he didn't recognise walk in. "Now please Murrue, tell me, what happened? How are you still alive, they told us, that you died at Alaska, defending it..."

Murrue sighed, and told them, about what happened during the war, as Alexander held her hand in support, how she met Alexander, leading a ship across space, to earth, across the globe, then the betrayal at Alaska, the retreat to Orb, then back to space, to bring an end to the war. During her tail, her father had come home, he was overjoyed to see his daughter sitting in his living room, despite seeing 'his little girl' holding some strange boy's hand.

"I'm sorry Murrue, I had no idea that anything like that had happened, we were so far removed from the war, here... We were so worried about you, the last we had heard from you, you were starting some secret project, that would help bring an end to the war..." spoke her father as he moved to look out into the back yard at the craft standing in it, "was that one of the things of that project?"

Murrue walked to stand beside her father, well pulling Alexander along with her, "No father, that would be Alexander's machine, I told you about it, I know it sounds like a bad peace of science fiction..." she squeezed both Alexander's and her father's hands, "I know that you feel a little un easy father, with Alexander noting being a natural, so to speak, but you taught myself and Timothy not to judge others because they are different."

The older man, sighed, as he looked to his daughter, she was right, he had brought them up that way, but he had hoped that she'd find a good natural man, but at least he was military, but what she had said about the Atlantic Federation, about what they had done to her, he found himself a little sick to his stomach, he himself was the commanding officer of a research division of the Atlantic Federation, he'd even had some combat images of the craft outside, seen it slaughter Daggers and GINN's with ease, there was even water damaged footage of this one, and eleven others like it, butchering the 4th fleet that was sent to attack Orb, he squeezed his daughter's hand, "Your right Murrue, I'll just be happy that you are here, right now, but you can't stay too long, we detected something, that over flew San Diego, earlier today... And my guess it would've been this craft, a Typhoon was it?"

Murrue nodded, sensing that her father had more on his mind about the Typhoon, than he was letting on, "Don't worry about those fighters father, Alexander and his people only want to keep the peace, they are not about to go around picking fights, there are too few of them to do something like that, but there is enough to try and prevent war from starting."

Her father gave a bit of a sigh of relief, before looking to the young man, standing with his daughter, and him, "Forgive me Captain, I must seem a bit foolish to you, looking at your machine wondering what it can really do... I saw the damaged video from the attacks on Orb, it was the first battle, where your craft, I recognise the numbers from the video, came from the sky, and struck the fleet with the furry of the heavens. And in the battles that happened after that one. Our Spearheads couldn't keep up with them, nor could the Strike Daggers stand up to them, in a gun fight."

Alexander smiled a little, "No sir, I understand completely, my Typhoon is unlike anything on this world. It's something that was breed for battle, out of a need for fighting superior foes, both in terms of numbers and capabilities. And you are a member of one of the military powers of this world, so you want to know as much as you can, about something that seems to out-class the latest and greatest of your top end units."

"Well at any rate, let us head in for dinner, it must be getting cold by now, not to sound ungrateful, but you two should probably head for Orb, afterwards, it's only a matter of time, before the military finds your machine in my back yard." Said the older man, walking into the dining hall.

As the Typhoon's engines started to howl to life, the group standing around it, a family of three, watched it lift into the air, change shape, from that of a man-jet hybrid, into that of a jet, it's engines flared and it shot out over the sea, leaving behind a shock wave of energy, that shattered windows, and set off car alarms.

During the flight back to Orb, the woman sitting across the lap of the pilot held him tightly, and bumped her helmet against his, well telling him, "Thank you Alex, that meant a lot to me. I know that my life there is over now, but this way, my parents know what happened to me, and they know that I'm safe, and happy."

He smiled back at her, "Your welcome, what do you say to a bath when we get back, we're both bound to be rather sweaty, I'm sure you can feel it, under the flight gear."

She winced and pulled the covers over her head, as light filled the room, it was too early still, this felt like a dream, she was in a warm comfy bed, she had had a blissful night, with her lover, she moved one hand over to the other side of the bed, searching for him.

Her hand hit nothing, a moment of fear gripped her, _what if it is all a dream?_, then it hit her nose, the smell of fresh coffee, and cooking eggs, bacon, and something else. Her eyes opened to see a room, that was made of wood, it's walls undecorated, boxes around the room, marked with her name, or his, the bed was in the center of the room, over a carpet that was a red circle with a black outer ring, with a white diamond in its center, she smiled looking at it, as she swung her feet out of the bed to touch it, it was soft, and lush.

_Curtains, that's what we need to put up today._ She thought to herself, as she pulled her house coat around her, lifting her long brown hair out, and over it, she found her slippers, and then started to make her way down stairs, she smiled as every third stair had a little creaking noise to it, it made the house feel much older, then it really was.

She stopped at the entrance to the small kitchen, and smiled more, there he was, his back was to her, events of last night replayed in her mind, bringing a slight blush to her cheeks, and he was cooking, she didn't know that he could actually cook, she leaned against the door frame, and watched him for a while, well remarking to herself, _he's mine, all mine. No more having to watch him fly off and risk his life, to just try and give us all a chance to make it through the day._

He slid some scrambled eggs, bacon and some shredded fried potato onto a plate, before placing it down, in front of her, "Morning sleepy head."

She looked to the spot on the counter, where they had the mugs, till they could be put away, she saw one with a picture of her ship and the words written around the picture of the ship read 'LCAM-01XA' below the picture of the ship, the name 'Arc-Angel', beside that white mug, was a second white mug, with a red circle, with a white diamond in the middle, in yellow letters across the top of the circle 'CVS-702 Victoria' and below it, 'VAF-103 Jolly Roger'. She picked up her mug, and filled it from the pot, well asking, "How long have you been up?"

He smiled at her, she was beautiful, in his mind, one of the most beautiful women he'd even been with or around for that matter, her milk-chocolate coloured hair, was a little dishevelled, her amber coloured eyes, sparkled happily, her milky white skin, his lips curled at the edges, as the memories of last night filled him, "Long enough. Did you sleep well? What do you think we should tackle first today, well after breakfast; there is so much to do still."

She nodded to him, as they sat side by side at the counter, the table was full of boxes, and she leaned against him, shutting her eyes, "You are too much of a morning person... But someone has to be, I guess." She kissed his left cheek, before poking at the food on his plate. "I'm not sure, but curtains are a must, it's almost too early to be up."

He danced his right hand up and down her side, listing to her giggle, and twist about, "Stop." She called playfully, kissing his cheek, well brushing the other one gently with her left hand; she looked him in the eyes, before kissing him deeply.

He lifted her into his lap, so that she was straddling him, and begun to kiss her neck, and shoulders, a cry of pleasure started to build in her throat, before it could escape, she placed her hands against his chest, and pushed him back, gently, smiling she said to him, "Alex, I love you." Tears started to make way down he cheeks, she had wanted to say that to him, for so long, and now that she did, it felt so good, she saw it in his green eyes, they were so soft, for the first time, they looked soft, warm, and very comforting, not that harden predatory look. She placed her left index finger against his lips, "But not right now, if we get going much more, we won't get anything done today, Erica and I do have some plans, to do a little bit of shopping for stuff to help make this house a home."

"Fine." He grumbled a little, before kissing her neck again, and letting her off of his lap, "Love you too, by the way."

Two women sat at a table, out in the sun, one was in white pants, with a bright red jacket, loosely done up, well the other had a knee length white skirt, and a white halter-top. "I'm surprised I was able to get you out of that house, would've thought you two would be in 'newly-wed' mode with getting that place sorted out."

The burnet with the chocolate brown hair just about coughed up her iced tea, "We're not like that. We've only been dating for about... Wow, has it been that long already?"

Her friend smiled, well patting her shoulder, "I remember seeing it, between you too at Morgenroete, when we were testing that engine, so yea, the better part of eight months I'd say. But I know, the war was going on, and you were both really busy with you know, trying to stay alive." She took a sip of her own drink, well watching her friend start to blush heavily. "Don't know what you are so embarrassed about, I mean there is nothing wrong with being happy you know, if anyone deserves it, it's you. Anyways, any thoughts on the offer?"

Murrue finally got her emotions under control, before responding, "Yes, and I think Alex is right, I'm going to take you up on it. I also think he's going to take the offer from the Orb military, to be a pilot, it's what he knows. And I think he'd be happy being able to fly still."

Erica Simmons sipped idly at her drink, looking at the people in the streets, thinking her words over carefully, "We've been looking at that system called a fold drive, we can almost copy it, but there seems to be some kind of element that we're missing. I know with the engineers we got from the Victoria, we've bounded a head in almost everything, but it's kind of sad, to one day, be at the leading edge of technology, then to have your eyes opened, and feel like you are back at being five years old, with no understanding of anything. What I've learned about the people there that the people from mixed families, like Alexander Kross, the children are on par with Olympic athletes. They are like Coordinators, without the flaws that come up after the third generation... some families are into 1/8th even 1/16th Meltrandi or Zentradi. Out of the 96 pilots from the Victoria, 90 of them are of Meltrandi decent, of the crew something like 2/3's of the ship are from mixed families..."

Murrue leaned back in the chair, looking up at the sun, "I know, it's strange, I know what you mean about third generation coordinators, and here we are with an air-craft carrier basically full of genetically engineered people, that don't have that problem..." Murrue started to laugh a little, "If PLANT found out, they'd hit the stars, and Blue Cosmos, well their heads would probably explode. And yet, all that those people want is to have a peaceful life... There was a line from an old band, I think they were called Metallica or something like that, 'to secure peace, is to prepare for war.'; I think that was how that quote went."

With their drinks finished Erica pulled her friend up, "Common we've got to get some of this shopping done, before the house warming party tonight."

"House warming party?" Murrue squeaked out, before being dragged off into the city.

"So let me get this right, this party, it's a tradition, for when people move into a new house?" he asked, looking at his girlfriend as they moved, some of the boxes into various closest, and furniture around.

"Yea, that's what Erica told me, the upside is, they bring food and drinks, as well has help out with the moving of things." She said as she flopped down on the red couch, she saw a CD sitting half out of a box, its cover had a blond woman, with big beautiful blue eyes, she was in a black corset, and not much else. As she looked it over, beside the blond woman, was a hand written signature, which she couldn't make out, she shrugged and placed it into the stereo, well flipping over the case, to see what the first song was called, as it started to play; it started soft, with violins.

Alexander turned his head, to see Murrue standing at the stereo, with a his signed Sheryl Nome CD in hand, listening to 'Diamond Crevasse', he walked up behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist, she leaned into him, and started to sway with him. "I only ever met her once, it was shortly after I became a Lieutenant, she was giving a concert to the 8th fleet, I was one of the pilots that took part in the display for the concert, doing acrobatics during the song 'Don't be late'. After the concert, she met with all the pilots, the six of us that took part, and gave us each a signed CD. She's one of the biggest acts where I'm from, I'd say like Miss Clyne, but well, a much larger fan base."

Murrue leaned against him, as the music changed, to something faster she turned to face him, and started to dance with him, before the guests were to arrive.

* * *

Well that would be chapter 5; I hope that it held up to everyone expectations. There are going to be time jumps in the next chapter, since writing day to day affairs can get a little boring to read.

Anyways, I hope you will all enjoy the next part, and as per usual, let me know what you think, and I'll do my best to address them in the A/N at the start.


	6. Chapter 6

By Dusks Late Shadow

A/N:

To answer the question I got about the size of the Victoria not being such a big issue, well I did some poking around, and an Uraga class carrier is only 130 meters longer then the Arc-Angel, 250 meters bigger than the Eternal. So I didn't really feel the need to make a big issue out of the size difference.

Reader,

I know I went kind of fast in the middle / end of Chapter 5, but every time I tried to write the big battle, it never came out how I wanted it too, I re-wrote it something like eight times, before I just said 'to hell with it.' But you're right; fighting will get harder for the crew of the Victoria, because some of the capabilities are known.

Anyways, On with the Show! (I hope this one is up to snuff at least.)

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

She rolled onto her side, and slowly opened an eye, to look at the clock, it was still half an hour before she had to be up, to be at work on time, her amber coloured eyes drifted to the man standing at the mirror adjusting his white uniform jacket, he'd only been in his old uniform twice now, in the last two months, the memory of the first one, brought a smile to her lips, well this one, was far more ceremonial, since he was the instructor for the first squadrons of Murasames.

The four large stripes of yellow on the black of the shoulders showing the rank of Captain, the silver eagle on each of his collars, the red circle and white diamond on his left arm, the gold wings over his heart, and the ribbons for engagements he'd been in, during his time as a fighter pilot.

He saw her in the mirror, awake; he smiled at her, before turning to kiss her forehead, telling her that he loves her, and that he'd be back for dinner tonight, as it was a special night.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"Ooh, common Murrue, tell us how he did it, please? I mean, I've seen the ring, you've been trying to keep hidden, and I heard he walked into your division, in his dress whites!" said a woman, pulling on her friend's hand, to try and see the ring again.

She sighed, and pulled her hand free, it would be the fourth time, since she got in today, just this time, it was in the middle of the mess hall, "You're right, he did show up, in his dress whites, walked right into the area that we were working in, right up to me, I'd made it no secret that I'm with someone from the Victoria, and at 4:03pm, he dropped to one knee in the middle of the room, and asked me to marry him. It was sweet, since it was right down to the second of when we first met during the war." It made her smile, to think, that it was just over a year ago now, that he'd floated into her life, and that so much had happened during that year. Their first month together, in the house hadn't been perfect, they had their share of fights, but she often enjoyed making up afterwards.

She had to almost cover her ears, as some of the younger girls that were in the lunch room that had also come to see the ring, squealed in delight, over her story.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

His afternoon class walked in to the room, taking their seats, and chatting happily amongst each other, as he walked in, his white uniform, caught the attention of everyone in the room, they fell silent, as he spoke. "I told you all that I'm not from Orb, or the Earth Federation or ZAFT for that matter. And let me guess, you didn't think I'd actually be a pilot, or that I'm a U.N.S. officer?"

A pilot with red hair put up his hand, before standing, "Sorry Colonel Kross, We just assumed that you were a mobile suit pilot from one of those three and not from the Victoria... But now that we know, what did you fly on the Victoria?"

Alexander smiled as he placed his mug, which he'd brought with him from home today, with the symbol facing the class, the crest of the skull and cross bones, "That should answer your question." He moved to sit at his desk, facing the class, as he took his cap off, and placing it on his desk.

With that crest being shown the entire room was silent for a few moments, before a blond woman asked "Sir, what number was yours or is yours, in Pirate squadron?"

Alexander raised an eyebrow, "Pirate squadron? I am Jolly Roger 01, call sign Reaper. I'm also the Commander Air Group for the Victoria. So you should all be feeling really lucky to have had me as your air combat instructor."

The blond woman, felt her cheeks flush, the actual names of the squadrons from the Victoria had not been released, but the crest of each squadron was known, some of the names, guessed at, were correct, but some, like that of the Jolly Roger, was a little off. She took her seat, and shifted a little uncomfortably.

Alexander smiled, a sly, predatory smile, one that he'd not shown in a good long time, he noticed as it made his students sink in the sets a little more, "So what now? Does this mean that my words that I've said to you all, over the last two months, have a lot more weight?"

He took a sip from his cup, before standing, to bring up a computer model of one of the worst in the class' last training sessions.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"I'm so happy for you Miss Murrue, well, I guess you won't be a 'Miss' for much longer will you?" asked a girl with pink hair, as she, along with a woman with hair of milk chocolate brown, and one with a light brown, almost blond hair were in a kitchen, chatting away, well preparing tea and dinner, for those that were in the other room, or outside, with a large group of children.

Murrue smiled a little, she didn't normally enjoy this amount of attention, especially all that she had received at work, over this, but here, amongst people that felt more like family, then anything else, it was different, "To be honest, I was surprised, I mean, we'd talked about it, but nothing really that serious... Don't get me wrong," she took a moment to make sure that the soup wouldn't burn, "I had a feeling that he was up to something, when he'd go out, and come back a few hours later, and avoid telling me, where he went. At first, I thought things were going badly between us, when it started to happen, but now that I know why," she looked at her ring, it wasn't super fancy, the diamond was known as a princess cut that was completely clear and looked like ice, set into a white gold band, simple yet elegant, "I can't help but love him a little bit more."

The third woman, took the spoon from Murrue, and nudged her to sit down, "Captain, you shouldn't be cooking right now, this party is for you and Captain Kross. I can't help but feel a little jealous, I mean you are the first of us three to get married..." she sighed a little, "And I've got a lot more work to do, like finding a decent guy for starters."

The three of them laughed a little, before the one with pink hair spoke again, "Miriallia, what about mister Elthman? You too seemed to be getting closer, during the later stages of the war..."

Miriallia rolled her eyes up and away before she spoke, "Yea, we were, but I slept with him, and the next day, he called to tell me he's going back to PLANT, from the space port. So that made me feel really good... don't suppose either of you have a brother at all? Or maybe Captain Kross, I want someone who is kind, I mean, I developed a lot of respect for Captain Kross, after he went back to get Tolle's body..." she almost fell into tears at that part.

Murrue stood to hug the younger woman, "I've got a little brother, but he's in San Diego... I wonder what Alex would think if I invited my parents out to Orb, maybe even some of my friends from there too..."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

They stood at the shuttle port, almost three months had passed since that night at the little home on the side of the sea with their friends, his leather jacket with a skull and cross bone on his left shoulder, a patch with his name, rank and a pair of wings over his heart was undone, a white shirt, and tan slacks, his copper blond hair closely cropped, small dark glasses covered his eyes, beside him, looking up at the flight listing, was a woman with shoulder length milk chocolate coloured hair, she wore a blue sundress, her skin had lost some of its milky colour, to become a little more tanned, but to her that was fine, part of the price to pay for living in a tropical nation, warm weather almost year round.

"Did any of them know, the other Alexander Kross?" he asked, as he gently caressed her left shoulder.

She smiled as he touched her, she loved it, it always sent what felt like a jolt of electricity through her body, "Katie did, they were siblings, sorry but you might find this a bit weird, when they get here... Are you sure you don't want to go and spend some time with your Typhoon, we'll were here? I mean it's the weekend, and I know you like coming here to spend some time with her, just listening to the engines, even if you don't have time to take a flight... We can always come and get you when they get their entire luggage."

He bent down to kiss her, then smiled, "Alright love, see you in a bit then."

She watched as he walked away, and smiled to herself, _He loves flying, almost as much as he loves me. It's hard to have two other things that I have to share him with, but well it's me, that he comes home too every night._ Her attention came back to the arrival doors, as they started to open, and she saw a pair of women and one young man, walking with a bit of a hunch to his back, behind them, she couldn't help but smile more. She stood and started to walk over to them.

When they saw her coming towards them, the two women squealed in delight, and started to run to their friend, whom they hadn't seen in over a year, and someone that they both thought was dead. They collided with each other, into a mass of squealing, laughing, cheerfulness; Murrue looked to her little brother, whom, was still trying to avoid standing upright, and asked, "Tim, what's wrong?"

Lily White, a woman of average height, her hair was a bright red, though normally more orange in colour, she chose to keep it dyed a bright almost fire-truck red, her eyes were a bright grassy green, she also was proud of her, as some would say voluptuous curves, "That would be my fault Murrue, I spent a lot of the flight leaning over him, as we got near Orb, to see these, well in the Atlantic Federation, we call them Raptors, mobile suits that look like jet fighters, with big engine intakes, and triangular wings on them, " she smiled a little more, as she hug her friend tightly, "and I think I might've 'peaked' his attention so to speak."

The three women laughed a little, well the young man, shifted a little more, feeling a little uncomfortable, Murrue pulled the group along to get their luggage, well she questioned them, "Well here they are called Typhoons, what do you know about them?"

This time it was Katie Kross, she looked somewhat like Alexander, but much more feminine, her eyes were the same green, her hair the same coppery blond, though her figure was much more slim then either Lily's or Murrue's, that responded, "Well we are both Strike Dagger pilots, we were briefed on them, after what happened to the 4th fleet, but we never saw one, up close. I mean it wasn't that close to the shuttle, but it was close enough that we got to take a good look at it... Anyways, so where is this guy you wanted us to meet?"

As they loaded the only bag, Murrue started to take them to where Alexander's hanger was, well she asked them, "So why are there only Tim's bring bags?"

"'Cause myself and Katie figured we can just buy what we need here in Orb, besides we're only here for a week." Said Lily as she placed an arm around Murrue's shoulders, well the other one, went around Katie, leaving Tim to walk behind the three women.

As the four of them reached a secured section after a short ride on a sub surface tram, a soldier in white body armour over a black battle dress uniform, over his heart was a red circle with a white diamond in the center, his rifle held across his body, it had something like a grenade launcher under the main barrel, the main barrel was a much smaller bore then any of the women present had seen before, except for Murrue, whom had seen them on the Victoria, walked up to the four of them, without needing to be prompted Murrue spoke up, "I'm here with friends and family, to see my fiancée, Captain Alexander Kross."

The U.N.S. marine knew who she is; he looked to the other three, before opening the gate, once they were out of ear shot, Katie spoke up, "That wasn't Orb defence forces body armour, and that rifle, was unlike anything I've ever seen before... You told me a little about your guy, but not a lot. So mind telling me why he has the same name as my late brother?"

Murrue sighed a little, "Alex both is, and isn't your brother Katie... Your brother is dead, this Alex isn't from our reality, and that marine that was at the gate, isn't either, nor are those Typhoons, or as you know them Raptors. And technically speaking, we are on another nation's land, since Orb's jurisdiction ended at that gate."

Lily blinked a couple of times, looking back at the gate, then at the row of hangers on either side of the taxi way, "Fastest customs I've ever been through..."

Murrue laughed a little, as she continued walking, "We are on United Nations Space Forces, U.N. Spacy for short, land at the moment, not a lot of people are aloud behind that gate, Orb and U.N. Spacy have a bit of a special relationship, they came to the aid of Orb during the war, and in exchange Orb gave them, a ship full of them, an area to build a base on."

Katie spoke up, as they passed a hanger with an open door, "Now wait, I've heard that we can't even get a satellite over this area..."

Murrue looked back at her friend, as they pushed on, passed the first of the Spectre hangers, "That's simple, they shoot them down. Orb has given the U.N.S. forces complete authority to do as they please in the area that this base covers, including the air-space, and orbital space, in exchange the U.N.S. helps out with defence needs, and has been good enough to help train Orb pilots in the new mobile suits, I'm sure you've got data on those."

As they entered the hanger marked with a Skull and Cross Bone logo, they could hear the whine of some engines, coming from one of bays, Murrue smiled though the hanger was almost devoid of people, save for a few green and brown jump suites running around, she took her group to where the whine was coming from.

Katie saw him, sitting in the cockpit, the canopy open, and a smile on his handsome features, her eyes traveled to the tails of the white, black and yellow craft, the skull and cross bones on them, with a 01 in the top aft comer under the yellow stripe at the tip, at the base of the tails, U.N.S. Victoria was printed in white, over the black of the tails, she felt her heart sink, at seeing him, the expression on his face, was just like that of her late brother, when he was happy, it took but a second, till his eyes opened. Once he noticed the group, he started to shut down the engines.

With everything shut down, he exited his fighter, walked up to the woman in the blue dress with the milk chocolate coloured hair, and kiss her, "Thanks for letting me do that, I appreciated it, even it was short."

She smiled and turned him to see everyone, she felt somewhat good, that he'd noticed her, and only her, especially with the presence of her friend Lily, whom always managed to steal whatever man she set her sights on, especially when wearing such a revealing outfit. Lily felt her cheeks go a bit flushed as she looked at him, well feeling a little envious of her friend for catching this one.

Tim was still with them, he'd steeped away to go up and touch Alexander's fighter, he had wanted to do that, when it was in his back yard, he was just an arm's reach away, when a wrench landed in front of him, as a pink haired girl started yelling at him, "Get away from the Captain's plane, you might be a guest here, but well she is on the ground, she is my plane, and my responsibility!"

"Careful Tim, C.P.O. Jones can get a touch testy about strange people going near my plane." He said with a smirk, after watching the boy jump back, behind his big sister, "I think we should get going, this area is restricted after all, and I'd rather not get you all detained because you came to collect me." He finished as he started to lead them out of the hangers.

The group had gotten even larger, as they had stopped for dinner in the main city of Orb, the restaurant was happy to have a party of eight sitting laughing, and enjoying themselves, at one end of the table sat Murrue, with Alexander right beside her. To Alexander's right was Kira Yamato, with his other half, Lacus Clyne, whom had drawn so much attention from the guests that were from the Atlantic Federation, for a while at least, across from Lacus, was Katie Kross, happily enjoying her drink, well stuffing her signed napkin into her purse, between Katie Kross, and Lily White, whom was across from Murrue, were Tim Ramius and Miriallia Haw, whom seemed to be deep in their own conversation, the sight of that, brought a smile to Murrue's lips, that was the main reason why she wanted to get her little brother to visit, based on what Miriallia had been saying to her, at the engagement party.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

She came down stairs, her house coat loosely done up, with a large smile on her face, they'd been married now, two weeks, she had found it hard to believe that her friends and little brother had left again, after making a showing for we wedding, she had found it reassuring that her little brother and Miriallia had seemed to hit it off, almost half a year ago now, though both were a bit more cool towards each other at the wedding, and reception, thinking about that day, she absently rubbed the left cheek of her bum, well smirking, one of Alex's fellow pilots had slapped her bum with a sword, and whispered to her "Fly navy."

She still found it hard to accept the hot weather during what she used to know as the coldest months of the year, as she walked over to her new husband, he was sitting on the red couch, watching the morning news, with a bit of a thoughtful look on his face, she smiled at him. Once she was behind him, she leaned over him, and wrapped her arms around his chest, bending at her hips so that her chin was on the top of his head of copper blond hair, the right side of her housecoat slipped from her shoulder, but she saw, what he did, events turning for the worst, at least the first signs of it coming, in the form of seeing the leaders of the Atlantic Federation, PLANT, and Orb, standing and debating something, but it was in their stances, one could read the iciness that was being shown between the Chairmen of the PLANT, and the President of the Atlantic Federation.

He raised his right arm, to gently caress her right breast, before moving to the right side of her head, "Sorry if I woke you, but this debacle was important to see... You missed the start, Copeland accused Durandal of keeping a secret force of mobile suits and a warship that had no known markings or fully disclosed capabilities. After he denied having anything like that, they turned on Cagalli. And she was forced to tell them, that they are a separate entity and that they should contact that ships commanding officer, if they wish to know about the abilities of those craft in question." He leaned his head back, to kiss his new wife, just as passionately as they had done every day, since they had to no longer worry about life or death on a daily basis.

"I've seen things like this before, a war is on the horizon. I can't make a guess as to how far away it is, but its coming." He said as he stood to take hold of her, and pull her into his lap, as he sat back down again, she giggles and sighed happily as his lips made their way down her neck.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

She enjoyed the feel of the hot water on her skin, as she showered off the sweat, she laughed as she though, _I don't think my sex life has ever been this good, he's always got so much energy_. As she moved her hands about with the soap she gasped a little as she hit a sensitive area, before smiling and sighing happily _Yup, still turned on, he always levels me feeling great afterwards._

Her shower was cut short, as she heard the phone ring, she managed to reach it, before the answering machine had picked up, she smiled as her friend Erica spoke, "Wow, I didn't think you'd answer, considering you two only got married two weeks ago, I'd have guessed that the two of you would still be 'busy' at this time of the morning."

She tied the towel she had brought with her, around her body, "Well, either you have grate timing, or it was just dumb luck that Alex had to report into the Victoria this morning."

On the other side of the screen of the video phone, Erica grinned, "By the way Murrue, you do have a really nice body, especially with that lack of tan lines... I'd kill to have a piece of my back yard being a privet beach. But I take it, that you at least saw the debate this morning?"

Murrue flushed somewhat as she shifted around a little, she hadn't really thought about it, forgetting that the phone was also capable of video transmission as well, then again, it was the number of one of her closer friends, "Yes, well sort of, I came down stairs as Alex was watching it," she smiled before continuing, "Well till he saw me that is."

Erica Simmons nodded, before leaning back in her chair, "The cat is out of the bag, about the Victoria, the Typhoons, everything, short of the full capabilities of everything in U.N. Spacy's bag 'o' tricks. She actually told them, that Orb has a symbiotic relationship with U.N. Spacy... I wouldn't be surprised if they are a little miffed with Orb after this one."

Murrue blinked a couple of times, her mind running with what might or might not happen, the towel slipped a little and fell into her lap again, "Erica, that's not funny, even with the advances Orb has made with them here helping us, they could still push Orb back, if not beat Orb into submission..."

"I know, but just so that you know, they stepped up security around Fort Victoria, they even have some of their destroids that they had on the Victoria standing guard at the gates now, I think they call them Tomahawks, they are pretty imposing sights, Typhoon squadrons are already flying patrols in their air-space, and the guards are now in tactical gear. It'd be my guess, they are kind of pissed off." Said the woman on the other side of the screen, as she stood to pour a cup of coffee.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

He walked into the commanding officer's officer, just as the older man spoke, "Good morning Captain, I'm sorry for having to cut your time with your new wife so short, but you saw the debate this morning I take it?"

Alexander nodded to his father, "Aye sir, I did, well mostly, we got a bit... distracted. But I guess things degraded from what I saw? That would be my guess based on the stationing of the Tomahawks at the gate..."

Captain Benjamin Kross, sat back in his chair, and looked out the window over the base, and his ship, now sitting in the day light, in the water at the end of a make shift port, "They did, I recommend that you and Murrue try to move on base, or it is going to be very hard to see each other, depending on how things progress from this point, I may be forced to prohibit any contact with Orb. As it stands, no-one gets through the gate, without an up to date security card, with photo, finger print, D.N.A. and retinal scan on it. As it is, right now, all Tomahawk units have orders to blast any mobile suit that approaches armed, back into the Stone Age. We've got Typhoons fly C.A.P. round the clock, with orders to shoot to kill, anything that is armed, and escort anything else out of the area."

Alexander took a seat opposite his father, and chose his words carefully, "If things keep on this path, are we going to make the first hostile action, because the orders given are that of an aggressive stance, because sooner or later, one of our people will pull a trigger, and start a war."

"Just till the Victoria is ready to launch and head into space, once that is done, we'll set charges in all the buildings, and rig them to go off, if anyone tries to enter them." Benjamin stood and moved to the window, "I really don't want to be forced down this path Alexander, but from what we've been able to learn about this world, our existence is now fully known to some of the most aggressive people of this world, and we are more or less, the prize, in terms of technology. We are something the people of this world will go to war over, without even asking us, how we feel. I did not give permission to the Princess of Orb to speak the words she did about our arrangement. Also something you should know Alexander, we've been in regular contact with the 8th fleet, though it is garbled, and slow at best. But knowing that there is a galaxy here, virtually unexplored, does hold some interest for City 8, since it's getting harder to find suitable planets in our own reality, they might come here, and if they do, then things will change here."

Alexander got to his feet quickly, his mind racing, "Sir, the fire power of the 8th fleet would destabilize everything here, Gunship 8 could wipe entire cites from the face of the planet, not to mention entire fleets, let alone the number of Typhoon and Spectres on Battle 8... Hell, then comes the rest of the fleet, if they think what we are doing now, is aggressive, they'd sure as all hell think a battle group suddenly arriving out of no-ware would be a sure fire sign as something aggressive."

"it can't be helped Alex, now I suggest that you go talk to Murrue, and get her to come and see us here at the base as soon as she can get here, because it is very important... she is my daughter in-law, and I do like the woman, so I'd like to see the two of you, not torn apart by all this." Said Benjamin as he pushed his son out the door.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"What?!" she asked in her office, as she dropped her cup of coffee to the ground, she was shocked by his words.

"I know Murrue, but the long and short of it is, we are gearing up, to fight to defend ourselves, just till we can get the Victoria ready to launch, after that, I don't know what's going to happen..." he said as he walked up behind his wife, unsure if he should hold her or not, he could see her shoulders starting to tremble.

"Alex," she turned to look at him, she could feel the tears starting to well up, "We just got married, we were just starting to be a family," she subconsciously placed her hands on her belly, she hadn't told him yet, but she was going on a month late, "and now you might have to start fighting another war, because Cagalli didn't think her words through, and didn't think what it might do, to an already stressful situation between Orb and the U.N.S.?" she took a step forward, balling her fists, she weakly hit his chest, as she fell into him, crying.

Alexander placed his arms around her, he kissed the top of her head, "I know Murrue, I really don't want this, I wanted a nice quite life, flying for fun, not having to pull a trigger, knowing that I'm doing it, to keep others safe, but still having blood on my hands because of it."

Murrue sniffed in the embrace, she thought about telling him, maybe it was subconscious or maybe it wasn't, but she stiffened when he asked, "Murrue, what's wrong?"

She lifted her head off of his chest, his jade green eyes, showing concern; she tried to rally all the inner strength she had developed as an acting Captain, "I'm really late."

He looked up at the clock, according to it; she was still on lunch break, "For a meeting?" he asked, not entirely sure as to what she meant.

She shook her head, negatively before she said those words over again, "No, I'm really late." That was when she saw it, in his eyes, for a fraction of a second, fear, it was the first time, she'd seen fear in his eyes, but it was covered over, by that predatory look, just as fast as it had entered his eyes.

He gulped, and felt his body stiffen, he fought to get his emotions under control as fast as he could, "You don't mean...?" his eyes moved down past hers, to where her belly would be, if it wasn't pressed against his.

She nodded her head slowly up and down, "I think so, I'm almost a month late..." her voice was so soft, there was a quiver in it, she had to admit it, she was scared too.

He held her tighter, now he had more than just his friends, parents, and wife to fight for, but also a son or daughter.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

It hadn't taken long, only a month, since that debacle between the three leaders of those nations, he was not pulling hard, but almost dragging her, and her bags with her, through a chain-linked fence, as a massive two toed foot stamped down, it's blackish blue armour, covered in dust, and chips of broken road way, they looked up, to see the hulking machine bring around one of its gun arms, and let fly a beam of energy at a target that was behind them, off in the distance they heard an explosion.

She pushed some of her milk chocolate brown hair back behind her left ear, as she saw the shoulders on the machine open to reveal 12 missiles in each one, with a cloud of white smoke, the missiles were launched from their racks, to rain death on those that were closing in on the base. With its missiles gone, the massive hulking machine started to walk backwards, still firing away at targets that neither person could see, then she felt it, a sharp burning pain in her right leg, then the sound came, as she fell to the ground, she knew that sound, it was an assault rifle.

She looked up from the ground to see her husband, stop and pick up a rifle from one of the U.N.S. marine whom was unable to fight after taking a shot between some of her armour plates, he was firing it, as he moved back to her, it made no sound, but she'd seen that blue-white muzzle flash before, she knew it was some kind of rail gun, the world was moving so slowly for her, her leg hurt so much, he was yelling something, but she couldn't hear it, that massive machine stopped moving backwards, and started to move towards her, it's weapons blazing away, machine guns on its head blasting away at the infantry that were trying to attack the base, as well as the weapon clusters on either side of its body, laying waste to the men and women that had nothing better than assault rifles, or the odd rocket launcher.

The massive black foot came down right behind her, making the ground shake, she watched her husband pass the rifle off, to one of the other marines, as he lifted her onto his shoulder, and issued the order to fall back.

He placed her in a jeep, and tied off her leg, just above the knee, to help slow the blood loss, before sitting beside her, he issued more orders to the driver. She wished her mind would process what was going on, but her leg hurt so much, it was all she could think about. As they came near the hangers, he jumped off, at his hanger, and dashed inside, and then the jeep started to move again, taking her to the ship sitting at the dock.

She struggled against the marines as they lifted her out of the jeep, and took her deep inside of the massive ship, her eyes trying to focus on the fighting; those had been Atlantic Federation uniforms, that they people attacking had been in, it bothered her, that Orb was letting this happen, but there was nothing she could do, as the door slammed shut, taking her from the first battle of the new war, that was starting.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Well that was Chapter 6, I hope that it met everyone's expectations; again I am sorry for the delays in its production, but this will more or less be the pace from now on, since my life is back to normal, in terms of what is going on.

Again, thank you all for reading, and please leave any and all comments, and I'll do what I can do, to address them at the start of the next chapter.


	7. Chapter 7

Shadow Lords

A/N:

To all my readers, it's nice to know, that you all really liked chapter 6, as to some of the comments I got, I will have a colony fleet, arriving, but I thought that the fleet make-up of the 7th fleet (Macross 7) was a little odd, if not stupid, so I'm altering the composition, as well as adding a few ship classes from here and there, as Carriers and Frigates for a fleet is well, just asking for problems. As to the events of GSD, well 'brake the world' to be more to the point, isn't in the style of the U.N.S. so if it does happen, it's not U.N. Spacy that does it.

Right, on with the Show!

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Cagalli stood in the command center for the Orb defence forces, beside her was her father, as well as her new 'husband' if one wanted to call him that, she had little like for the man, not like the boy with the dark hair that held her heart, but this was not the time to think of that, she was shaking with anger, beside her father stood an officer from the Atlantic Federation.

Her anger was directed at the display it was showing a battle that was going on, on one of the main streets in the main city of Orb, a group of four blue and white machines, Strike Daggers they are called, she remained herself, were walking down the road, as one of the dark blue, almost black machines from the U.N.S., a Tomahawk, that was its name, or that she thought it was, opened fire with its two gun arms, the beams blew two of the Strike Daggers apart, hitting them in the center of the body.

The two remaining Daggers opened fire, with the rifles they each had, the blue-black machine, fell to one knee, and slid to the left a little, to dodge the beams, before letting fly another blast, cleaving one of the Daggers in two, at the waist.

The last Dagger, jumped to the left as it fired the rifle, slamming into the tall building, the Tomahawk tried to get out of the way, but was a little on the slow side, the green beam hit it in the right shoulder, where the concealed missile rack was, it took a moment, as it sparked, then exploded, taking the right arm, shoulder, and shoulder mounted missile rack with it. As the Dagger lifted its self from the ruined building, to see if it had killed the blue-black titan, the Tomahawk fired with the other arm, ending the engagement in the blast from its particle beam weapon.

The man from the Atlantic Federation coughed a little, before speaking, "That was unexpected. I didn't think it would beat four Strike Daggers, those things truly are marvellous, and I can't wait till we get our hands on them."

One of the Orb officers, pulled their head-set off, and called for the attention from everyone in the room, "Sirs, We've gotten reports of Spectre class bombers and Typhoon class interceptors attacking Orb military installations, casualties are heavy... We've also lost contact with the base on Onogoro Island... Astray and Murasame units are proving ineffective, at countering Typhoon and Tomahawk units from the U.N.S."

Cagalli was watching the readouts as they came in, the U.N.S. forces had a tight hold on the base that they had set up, on one of the small islands to the south of the main island. She hated this, but she knew that she was partly to blame, even her father had chided her, for using words at that summit between the leaders of Orb, PLANT, and the Atlantic Federation, it had been Yuna Roma, that had pushed for letting the Atlantic Federation attack the U.N.S. before they could mount an attack, let the Atlantic Federation take the brunt of the counter attack from the U.N.S. then Orb moves in, to clean up what is left over, well that had been the plan anyways, but these ground units, Tomahawks were very good at what they were doing, holding the line, and pressing attacks, under the support of Typhoons. She sighed heavily as the numbers of casualties started to roll in, it was going to be a long day.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Murrue sat on a bed, it'd been a few hours since she had been taken out of the, as they called it 'The Knitters', her leg felt better, and unlike her shoulder she couldn't feel where she'd been shot, even to this day, almost two years after she could still feel that wound to her shoulder, from time to time. Her milk chocolate hair was damp and think with the fluid that she had been floating in, as the machine had stitched, well making new layers of muscle tendon and finally skin, as the tiny hands moved up and down her right calf repairing the damage.

She hugged the white fluffy towel around her; the sick bay of this ship was colder, both in terms of temperature, and feel, then the one on the Arc-Angle, though the temperature could be because of the fact, that she was naked under the towel, they'd taken her underwear along with her jeans, that had a hole as well as blood on them, and her top, she sighed, they had been taken for cleaning, but at least they had a female nurse, with a towel waiting for her, out of the vat, that she was in. The doctor had been kind, when dealing with her.

She slipped off the bed, and winced the floor was cold, and hard, she wrapped the towel around herself, being a little thankful that she was only into her second month at being pregnant, again she touched her belly, wondering how life would get back to normal now, or if this was going to be normal for her, her attention was snapped to the door behind her, as she heard it open.

An older man walked in, and placed his officer's cap, under his arm, and gave her a warm smile, "I hope that 'The Knitters' wasn't too hard on you. Personally I detest being in that tank, though I remember Alexander almost living in it, when he was younger."

She gave him a soft smile, still feeling a little uneasy, "No, but it was strange, almost two years after getting shot in one of my shoulders, I still feel it from time to time, but this, if my brain didn't know I'd been shot in the leg, I'd never know about it..."

He nodded before placing a hand on her shoulder, "So what are you going to do now? I'm not about to put my daughter in-law off my ship, but I'm not going to ask a pregnant woman to stay on a ship that's going to go into battle."

She froze, aside from herself, Alexander, and her doctor no-one else knew yet, as far as she knew, "How... who told you?"

"Doctor Birmingham did, it came up in your blood work. He told me, and I wanted to talk to you in person anyways." Said Benjamin Kross, as he stood beside his daughter in-law, "Don't worry, 'The Knitters' didn't do anything that could've threatened the baby, but you should've said something. I do have an interest in my grandchild's health after all, now that I know that I have one coming."

Murrue hugged her belly, and looked over at her father-in-law, "We were going to tell you and Celica, tonight actually, but then this all happened, the running, the shooting, and the getting my leg put back together... I'm worried, if I'll be a good mother, I know Alex will be a good father; he tries so hard to do the right thing, and goes that extra mile, when he can... I also worry that our baby will forgive us, for being soldiers, fighting in wars, having killed people..."

Benjamin Kross nodded, and patted the shoulder of the woman beside him, "Murrue, you'll be fine mother, and I can tell you, that I'm personally tickled pink about being a grandfather, and I know that Celica will be happy to be a grandmother. And if anything your baby, will come out with their, very own pair of navy dress whites."

Murrue felt herself laugh a little, she liked her father-in-law, like Alexander, he tried to make her laugh, when she felt scared.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Lily White stood on the deck of the carrier, her team had been held in reserve, her friend Katie Kross, was beside her, they were watching the young men around the deck, "I hope Murrue is okay... I hear the first attack happened less than a block from her and Alex's place."

Katie ran a gloved hand through her blond hair, as a sound caught her attention, she looked up, and noticed a profile she'd been briefed on, several times, it had this whistle to it, her eyes watched as it dipped low, then out over the water, and changed shape, it's tails folded onto the sides of its massive engines, the wings curled down a little. She caught the attention of one of the deck hands, to get his binoculars, as she zoomed in on the object, she could tell its colour, white, with black tails, and yellow highlights. But it was the skull and cross bone on its tails that made her drop the binoculars, and grab Lily by the front of her flight suit, and pull her to the deck.

The two women crashed down on the metal deck, as the craft, opened fire, with beam weapons that were mounted in the wings, near the main body, well a blue-white flash came from under the craft.

The ship they were on rocked and shuttered as the beam weapons hit its hull, cleaving the aft section of the carrier from it, the cannon under the body hit some of the people on the deck, Lily had seen people die, but never so close, the entrails, blood, and muscles from an enlisted crewmen, that she kind of liked, splattered over her face, as he exploded from whatever it was that tore him apart.

As the white craft went over the deck of the ship so fast that, Lily and Katie found themselves being sucked up into the air, to land in the water, some 60 meters from the ship, as it slowly started to sink, as the reality of what just happened started to sink in, the craft shot skyward, and vanished out of sight.

Katie spit out some water, and looked to her friend, "I don't know if she is or not, but I think Alex is kind of pissed, since that was him, that just kicked the crap out of our ship."

Her friend started to swim for one of the other ships in the fleet, as she said, "It could be worse Katie, at least the water is warm." Katie rolled her eyes, as she started to swim for the nearby cruiser.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Alexander rolled his Typhoon in a large loop, and came down again on the fleet, this time letting fly a volley of missiles, at one ship. As he got low to the water again, he strafed some of the people in the water, he knew that he had hit some of them, as the water started to turn red from the gore around them.

As the ship that he hit with the missiles exploded in a storm of fire and metal, he directed his craft to go and assist some of the Tomahawks that were trapped in the cities trying to fight their way to base for pick up. As her flew through the fleet, he opened fire with the rail-gun, hitting more people in the water, as well as ships, on his way inland.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Some six hours after the battle had started, the Victoria was loaded with most of its wayward units, the ship started to make its way out of the port, bringing the laser cannon batteries to bear on ships, well it fired missiles at air-craft.

On the decks of the remaining Atlantic Federation ships, the crews stopped to watch this leviathan of metal lift from the ocean, and start to fly higher and higher, soon leaving the weapon ranges of the ships, and eventually out of sight.

When the Victoria was out of sight, the island that had been their base, gave off a bright light, then a deafening explosion, and a massive mushroom cloud, as the island vanished from the surface of the planet, denying anyone the spoils of what might have been left behind.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

She padded down the white top and skirt, she wished it was little longer, mid thigh was showing a little much, especially with no stockings. She looked over to Alexander, in a deep sleep on the bed, arms stretched out to either side, hit feet still in his boots, his flight gear still on, even in the dim light she could see that it was soaked in sweat, the uniform she now wore was one of the U.N.S. Celica, had offered to let Murrue to run the combat information center on the Victoria, as the person that normal ran it, had failed to make it back to the Victoria in time.

_This uniform will only last me a couple of months at best, before it's going to be too small._ Were her thoughts, as she still looked at her husband in a deep sleep, she leaned over and kissed his forehead, before heading off to the combat information center.

It'd been a while since she had actually worn heals, sure her old boots had them, but these were closer to pumps, she found it a little amusing to hear the clicking sound they made as she walked the deck, the door slid open to the CIC and she moved to take her seat, hoping that the Atlantic Federation would have a hard time to mobilize a space fleet to intercept them, as the Victoria found a safe place to hide, well final adjustments were made, to operate back in space again.

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A man in a white robe with purple shoulders, his hair almost the colour of space, sat in a chair, in a darkly lit room, reading a series of reports, he mused to himself, _Well this is interesting, they not only beat back the Atlantic Federation, but also put the hurt on Orb at the same time. Perhaps letting the white dragon lie would have been best. But now that it is awake, perhaps we best slay it, before too long._

He tossed the reports to his desk, and picked up another one, it mentioned the re-patronization of an Athrun Zala, placing him back into a red uniform, and needing an assignment to a new machine as well as a unit, with a quick motion of a pen, a Commander Zala, was back into the special forces, but as for a machine, well, that would take some doing, something best left for later.

He stood and walked to the glass fish tank in the far corner of the room, and tapped the glass, _But how does one kill a dragon, that is now on the war path? Those that guard it, will put up a very strong fight, and even with the advances we've made, we still can't match them unit for unit._

He smiled as one of the fish came over to the glass to stare at him as he tapped the glass.

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A blond girl sat in the office of a man with a thick dark beard with long dark hair, beside her sat a skinny man, with a light purple hair, the older man, with the beard, slammed the papers hard on the desk, causing the girl to jump in her seat, "Thousands dead or wounded, the damage to the base on Onogoro tallies into the billions, the collateral damage to the capital, is in the millions, even civilians were hurt during the fighting. Ironically the U.N.S. forces are not the ones at fault for hurting the civilians; they actually let their machines become damaged to **prevent** civilian casualties!"

He stood and walked to the window, to look outside, the Atlantic Federation had left their boarders after the departure of the Victoria, however the city still showed the signs of the damage caused from the fighting, blown apart buildings, twisted hulks of metal that were mobile suites, he cursed at himself for allowing Cagalli to take over the leading government, "And you my so called 'son in law' how could you be so foolish, to even think, that the people from the Victoria wouldn't put up a fight? Did you not think that a cornered tiger would not strike out? Or is it that you just don't think!"

The man with the light purple hair spoke up, "No, I thought that they would not be able to..."

His words were cut short as the older man, turned on him, and slapped him so hard, that he was knocked to the floor, "Did you not see what happened during the first war? They came to our aid; they were freely trading their technology with us! And now, you've gone and made us a very powerful enemy! They dealt us such a serious blow, that I doubt we will recover from it, any time soon. And you, my daughter, I asked you to think about what you were going to say, I asked you to talk to Captain Benjamin Kross, if the question about he and his people came up, and you didn't you just acted, you always just act, and never think things through... perhaps we could've smoothed things out with them, but the past is the past, and now we must think about the future." With that, he turned back to the window, and told them to leave him be.

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Kira and Lacus were walking along a portion of the beach, it was early morning when they saw it, or rather what was left of it, a bloated corps of a man, that had been torn apart by weapons fire, Kira looked over to his girlfriend as she covered her mouth well gasping, she hadn't really seen what happens to a body after death, nor had Kira for that matter, but he kept his horror under control, the couple pressed on, but the beach soon became a morgue with the corpses washing up.

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Murrue stood in line in the Officer's mess hall, onboard the Victoria, she was tired, her feet hurt a little, her shift in the CIC had been long, but had smiled when she had seen her husband on the screen asking for permission to launch. As her try was filled, she moved out of the line, and started to look around the room, seeing a couple of women that worked in the CIC waving to her, she smiled and took a seat with them.

"Welcome to the _Bridge Bunnies_ Lieutenant." said a girl with bright red hair, she couldn't have been more then 17, Murrue look around the table, aside from herself there were five others, not one of them, looked older than 22.

"Gosh I'm so envious Lieutenant, you're married to _Reaper_, and he was the most sought after guy on the ship... I guess I'll have to keep looking now, ooh! Look there's Jolly Roger Squadron now!" said a blond girl as she pointed to the view port, as two Typhoons shot past, both with the Skull and Cross Bone crest, with 01 and 02 on the tails.

Murrue smiled to herself, she was being accepted as part of the crew, she didn't have to try and put herself away from them.

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A few days had come and gone, Murrue's time in the CIC had been hard, getting used to all the new protocols to use, but she had seen on the RADAR display that both ZAFT and the Atlantic Federation had started looking for them, but she had to admit that the U.N.S. forces were adept at surveillance without being detected.

She sat in a room with the heads of the various departments on the ship, a display of what was going on, around them, it was Alexander that spoke first, "Let's just hit ZAFT where it hurts then fade back to the ruins here. We'll strike at their main military base here," he highlighted a space station, "A squadron of Spectres with Typhoon escort should be able to get in, and give them a little present of harpoons, then run like hell, as they try to get their feet under them."

The captain of the ship, laced his fingers together, and thought it over, before speaking, "It's ballsy, but considering that some of our recon plans have been attacked by ZAFT units, I'm willing to try something ballsy. Alright _Reaper_, you've got my permission to try it, I'll leave the details up to you."

With that the meeting came to a close, Murrue sat, and watched her husband collecting his thoughts looking at the map, she chose her words, before speaking, "Alex, I've never seen this side of you, your being rather vicious...it kind of scares me."

Alexander's thoughts were pulled from planning the mission, he turned to look at his wife, and she saw that predatory look on his face, as well as in his eyes again, "Sorry, but you've never seen me, really fighting a war... It was something I had wished you to never see. But I have to right now, to protect you, and our baby. I really don't want to do any of this, but sometimes we have no choice in what we do." He walked over to give her a quick kiss, "No matter what happens Murrue, I love you, my only goal here is to cripple ZAFT, then the Atlantic Federation, once that's done, should the 8th fleet arrive, we will be able to force a peace, and be able to maintain it."

Murrue smiled a little, well placing her hands over her belly, she was worried, and she understood why he was fighting this way, but didn't like it, especially this side of Alexander, she found it a little frightening, he was so cold and brutal, she had heard about what he'd done to people in the water off the coast of Orb.

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Athrun Zala, stood on the bridge of the ship he'd been assigned to, the _Minerva_ was the name of the ship, to his right sat a red haired girl with her hair in pigtails, at a position in the CIC, she blinked a couple of times, looking at the read out, before waving him over to look at it, "See there." She pointed out 24 blips on the RADAR, "Then they vanish again." Sure enough they did, before the computed could get an identification class on them.

Like clockwork, the blips would appear, and then vanish before the computer could figure out what they are, Athrun moved to the windows at the far end of the bridge, to look out and try to see them, he could almost see them, then that girl called out again, loudly, and with some fear in her voice, "Captain, Flankers and Blackjacks closing on Armoury 01, detecting targeting RADAR from the Blackjacks!"

The blond woman in the white uniform turned in her chair to look at the girl in the CIC position, a look of disbelief on her face, she was about to say something, when the girl called out again, "Missiles launched from the Blackjacks... Captain, they are Anti-shipping missiles!"

The crew of the ship could do nothing but watch the 24 smaller lights broke away from the 48 larger lights, the larger lights turned to run, as the smaller ones, started to impact against Armoury 01. With a great blinding flash, the massive base was reduced to space debris, all the men, women, and machines that had been onboard lost, to the crucible of nuclear fire.

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A man with a fine manicure sat in front of a series of screens, replaying the images over and over, he smiled every time, he watched that space station be destroyed, _perhaps things would turn out well for us, if these space monsters fought and killed one another._ He thought as he stroked the fur of his cat.

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The raid on Armoury 01 had been a success, but had left the Victoria with no place to hide; the ship was in open space, locked in a fight with both sides, the Typhoons were hammering away at the mobile suits of both sides, well the ships hammered away at the Victoria, the ship was powerful, but lacked close range weapons to handle ship to ship fighting, on this scale.

Murrue was strapped into her seat in the CIC as the ship rocked from side to side, as they took another hit, she was trying to coordinate a counter attack, but they were left on they were unable to mount an attack, then she saw it, a flash text message, she opened it, all it gave was a set of coordinates, she relayed the message to the helm, well bursting it out to the Typhoons, on the display before her, she watched as the Typhoons moved, very fast, to get out of the way of something, she let herself a moment to look out the window, just as a bright orangey-red beam hit the Atlantic Federation fleet.

She watched as ships that weren't even hit by the beam pealed back, the armour first, then the decks, even the frame of the ship, before they vanished in a bright ball of fire, the ships that had been hit, just weren't there anymore, as she heard hooting and cries of joy from around the bridge, she looked at his display, the Atlantic Federation ships, were gone, some of the mobile suits were there still, but not many, the ZAFT forces seemed to have pulled back, then she saw it, on the very edge of the display, a massive capital ship marker, this one was blue, above it read, MACROSS 08.

It came over the loud speakers on the bridge, "This is Admiral Jefferson Halsey, Commanding officer of the 8th fleet. Ben, you seem to be in a spot of trouble, hope you don't mind us coming to the party?"

Murrue watched her father-in-law give a board grin, and respond with, "Not at all Jeff thanks for the timely rescue."

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I know a bit of a shot chapter, but a lot did happen. Please leave all questions, comments and what not, in the reviews section, and I'll do my best to address them.

Thank you for reading this far, and I hope I can keep up with your expectations.


	8. Chapter 8

End Game

A/N:

Well here I go, with an expanded and re-written version for part 8 of _Feathers and Bones_, and I do hope that this one will give a better and cleaner end to things.

Right, on with the show!

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Murrue stood on the observation deck, in Alexander's arms; she leaned against his chest, well slowly counting the ships, "41, 42, 43... And the Victoria makes 44?"

He kissed the top of her head, "Right, Macross 08, also known as Battle 08, supported by the Victoria, the Yorktown, the Berlin, and the Lexington." He said as he pointed to the new Macross Class ship, attached to a large craft, that was a floating city, then to the other three sister ships to the Victoria, with the craft they pulled, "Then we have the Arch-Angel, the Solaris, the Seraphim, and the Valkyrie." As he pointed to the four massive battle ships, "They are almost carbon copies of the Super Dimensional Fortress 01, then come all of the cruisers, destroyers and Frigates. But this is a typical U.N.S. fleet."

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Lily White, and Katie Kross, sat in a brig of one of the U.N.S. capital ships, lying in the beds that were there, looking up at the bare metal above their heads. Lily looked to the door, as she heard it open, in the light from the outside, she could make out three figures, two of them in that body armour the marines of these people wore, and they both had weapons that looked like tactical shotguns. Well the third person wore a black uniform, with black gloves; the two marines entered the room, and lifted the two girls roughly from their beds, to fallow the third person down the halls.

When the little convoy had reached the room, the one in black opened the door and walked in, taking a seat at the table, well the two marines pushed both girls to sit at the table, before flanking the only door into or out of the room.

As the door shut, the one in black removed their cap, the woman that sat across from both Lily and Katie, gave them both a hardened look, before she spoke, "I'm Lieutenant Smith, I'll be handling your interrogation. And don't mind the marines they are here, encase you get any stupid ideas."

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Yzak Joule slammed his fist into a console in his command room, aboard his ship the _Voltaire_, it was bad enough he had to take 'his' orders again, but they had had that ship on the ropes. _Those bastards! They get to kick us in the crotch by sacking Armoury 01, killing the bulk of the commanding officers, destroying countless ships, mobile suits, and people, then we almost have them for it, then they get support!_

His thoughts were cut short, as the door opened, and he noticed an old friend of his walk into the room, a smug smile on his tanned skin, "Kind of pisses you off huh? First you have to listen to Athrun again, but the Victoria was almost sunk, then they get supported by one of the biggest fleets I've ever seen, but that gun, it didn't even have to _hit_ ships to blow them up, and the range, they shot from over 150,000 km away... Yzak, I know they hit us bad, but I'm not too hot on picking a fight with people that can wipe out fleets from so far away."

The silver haired man, settled into his seat, still fuming, "Don't you think I know that! It's one thing to fight a battle when you have number on your side, or on equal terms, but they have a fleet, of 44 war ships, and a few non-warships... And who knows how many Flankers and Blackjacks they have in that fleet. The Victoria alone had almost 100. The blow to Armoury 01 has set us back big, and it will talk a long time, before ZAFT will be able to put up a fight to anyone... But I can't help but wonder, what is going to happen to the Atlantic Federation now."

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The man in the white robe, with the purple shoulders, his hair a the colour of space, sat in the middle of the council chambers of PLANT, all of the various council members were split into one of two camps, those that wanted to sue for peace, and others that wanted blood, for the nuclear attack and destruction of Armoury 01, he sighed to himself before he spoke, "Councilmen please, I have something very important to show all of you."

He pressed play, and across the monitors in the room, video play back, from the _Voltaire_ started to play.

The ship known as the Victoria was clearly seen in the image, under heavy attack from both ZAFT forces and Atlantic Federation forces, they were pummelling the ship badly, then in the far right, it looked like some kind of flash of a star, then an orangey-red beam ripped its way through the battle field, the beam washed over half of the fleet from the Atlantic Federation, well the other half of the fleet, first the armour pealed back, followed by the decks, and finally the frame work of the ship, before they vanished in balls of fire. The ships that had been hit by the beam, were simply not there, when the beam faded away, not even debris of them were left.

The people in the hall, gasped almost in unison, then the play back, zoomed, and zoomed, and zoomed, till a ship, that looked somewhat like the Victoria could be seen, attached to some large disk shaped object, and that was when Chairmen Durandal paused the play back, "I don't know what they want now, but the forces of that ship, the Victoria, now have support. They also seem to have a weapon, which can strike from more than 150,000 km away, and is capable of wiping out entire fleets. It's power out-put, places it beyond that of a positron cannon, somewhere near that of the super weapon GENESIS, we do not know the rate of fire for this weapon, but they are willing to use it. After what has been done to us, I do not think, we should continue to attack them, but we should simply look the other way, and see what they do next."

His words were met with mumbled words, but his point had been made.

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Alexander and Murrue, steeped off of the shuttle, that had taken them from the Victoria to Macross 08, along with Captain Benjamin Kross, in the landing bay, Murrue looked around, to see lots of Captains, she nudged Alexander, and questioned him with her eyes, he gave her a soft smile, before speaking, "The Admiral, wanted all the Captains here, to talk plans, so that's why I'm here. But we are here, because after this meeting, we are on vacation for a week."

She smiled and linked her right arm through his left one, and kept pace, to the meeting room.

Murrue looked at the short man, in a grand looking white uniform sitting at the far end of a large wooden table, _even for someone that must be in their 60's by now, he's still fairly handsome._ She thought to herself, well paying attention to the discussion going on around her.

"We were able to learn the position of," Admiral Halsey spoke, as he flipped through a report, "Atlantic Federation? Has their main base. Since we've stumbled into a delicate situation, in terms of maintaining the local power balance, I'm in favour of obliterating their main base and factories, since a raiding party from the Victoria already sacked something like it, from another faction."

Alexander shifted a little at the mention of the raid that he planned and executed, well the Admiral continued, "At 1530 hours, two days from now, we will hit this 'H_eaven's Base'_ from orbit, with Gunship 08, the crater left behind should be about 100 km across, and some 300 meters deep. After this, we will start peace talks with the peoples of this world, as the wishes from the President of City 08. So those are our orders, let's carry them out. You are all dismissed, except for you Captain Kross, the pilot, not you Benjamin."

As everyone stood to leave, Murrue also stood, but the old man, gave her a quick glance, before giving a soft smile, "You can stay as well, I'm well aware of who you are." The old man, walked over, and took a seat on the table, beside Alexander, and placed a file in front of him, "You've been gone a long time Alexander, have you given any thoughts as to where you want to go from being a pilot?"

Alexander looked at the top of the file folder, seeing that it was his personnel jacket, he gave an inward sigh before he spoke, "No sir, but I do know what I'd like, how ever what I'd like, and what happens are not always the same thing."

Jefferson Halsey smiled to himself, he'd known Alexander since he was a small boy, it'd been luck that he had been first to reach the rank of Admiral and not Benjamin Kross, despite the appointment, it hadn't ruined the friendship between the two men, "Well this is what is going to happen, the Commanding officer of the Seraphim has retired to seek a role in politics in the next election, and the executive officer has as well. And I am not about to have a warship without an experienced officer leading it. So in a roundabout way," he paused to look over at Murrue, "I'm giving you a ship Alexander, the price tag is, you stop flying, but you get to skip the progression from Frigate to Destroyer to Cruiser and so on. Now, I should punish you for getting involved with the internal conflicts going on here, but you didn't have a choice. Now you're going to take command of the Seraphim, after your R&R, that way I can keep an eye on you, and keep you under my thumb till you prove to me, that I don't have to watch you, and make sure that you don't use such a powerful ship to pick fights."

Murrue felt a little conflicted, the last part of the Admiral's words were said with some jest in his voice, but the words were also rather cutting, but deep down, she was proud of her husband, not even 30 yet, and he had command of a battle ship! Her eyes fixed on Alexander, and she squeezed his right hand with both of hers, to give him some support.

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Murrue stood beside her husband as they got their key to the hotel room, that had been booked for them on a resort ship, that was attached to the Yorktown, it shocked Murrue to see, a fully contained beach type environment inside of a space craft, even the short trip that they had taken into City 8, for a bit of shopping, had surprised her, the city was like that of the main city in Orb, just in space, all the people, the sounds and smells, it was hard to believe that she was in a space ship.

As they got to their room, and the door shut behind them, she kissed Alexander deeply, and pressed herself against him, it'd been almost three weeks, since they had actually had any real time off, it'd either been him just going on shift, just as she was getting off shift, or the other way around, she sighed happily as his hands roamed her body, pulling their clothing off, she'd been worried that perhaps he was feeling less attracted to her, knowing that she's caring his baby, but those fears were put to bed, almost as fast as she was, with him playfully pushing her to the bed.

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Katie Kross stomped back and forth across her little cell, glaring at her friend Lily, "How could you just give up the location of _Heaven's Base_ like that Lily?"

Lily looked at her friend, and sighed, "Katie, why were we even fighting the U.N.S. in the first place? I don't mind fighting a war, if I know why we are doing it. But we had no reason to attack them, they didn't do anything to us, they weren't planning to do anything, so my question is what the hell were we doing?"

Katie stopped her pacing, and just looked at Lily, _Damn it! She's right; we didn't have a reason to do anything._ "We're soldiers! _It's not ours to question why, it's ours to do or die!_"

"Well maybe I didn't want to die, for no good reason! If we only went after them for the off chance we could get the technology, well then that's bull shit! And I refuse to fallow those orders." Screamed Lily as she got to her feet, "You saw what the U.N.S. fleet did to our fleet with just one fucking shot! Do you honestly think that they couldn't find _Heaven's Base_ if they wanted too?"

The two women were in each other's face, as the door opened as two marines walked in, well a third one slid the food trays along the ground to them, before leaving the room again.

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Cagalli sat in the main room of her home, her bother and for lack of an official piece of paper, sister-in-law, watching the play back, from an Orb spy satellite, showing the Atlantic Federation being wiped out by the U.N.S. fleet, in a single shot. She looked over to her brother, and said "Kira, I'm scared. I don't know what to do, what if they turn on Orb again, we wouldn't stand a chance against them, especially after what happened when they left earth..."

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A girl with red hair, in pigtails rolled over in bed to look at the boy that shared her bed, "Athrun, what do you think, about that U.N.S. fleet, I've never seen such a powerful force... They let us pull back, and didn't press the fight, what do you think is going to happen now?"

The boy placed an arm around her, and pulled her close, "I don't know Meyrin, and I really don't want to have to fight them. I'd much rather stay here." He finished by kissing her deeply.

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Kira and those that he held dear to him, were gathered around a TV, when it happened, the screen went fuzzy, before them image stabilized, a wooden podium was in front of a red piece of fabric, they symbol of the U.N.S. could clearly be seen, on the podium. Then a woman, with bubblegum pink hair, in a very nicely cut suit with a skirt, the black of the suit stood out against the red, her skin was so soft, and looked almost like porcelain, she took her place behind the podium, and spoke, "My name is Lacus Hibbiki, and I am the President of City 08. I am the leader of the civilian government of this colony fleet, and I come to you today, to say that we do not wish any more hostilities. We know that we've stumbled into a delectate situation, and have upset that balance,"

She stopped talking, as the screen was split in two, to show the flag ship of the fleet, fire a massive orangey-red beam at the earth, before she continued, "that balance has now been restored, and now, we wish to stop brandishing our swords to our cousins of this world, but extend the open hand of friendship."

Kira held the hand of his girl-friend tightly, the Lacus that was on the TV was older, she must've been in her thirties, but her voice was the same, she carried herself with a degree that he'd not expected to see, he looked over to his Lacus, to see her smile at him, as she said, "Good to know that we met, and got married in that reality, but it is odd, to hear a speech about making peace, to have an act of war, be done during it... I wonder they hit with that weapon..."

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Chairmen Durandal, fell back in his chair, that beam had left a massive crater where the Atlantic Federation's largest base had been, not just a base, but a manufacturing center, gone. _I don't care, we cannot afford to fight these people, they offer us peace, at the tip of a sword, and how is that peace?_

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"Did you hear? We're getting our new C.O. and X.O. today, I wonder what they are going to be like?" said a girl with dark hair, as she spun in her chair at the RADAR display on the bridge of the Seraphim, a fortress class battleship.

"So long as our new C.O. isn't a complete hard-ass like Captain Manning was, I'll be happy" said a girl with bright red hair, as she stood from the helm of the ship.

"I hear, it's a _he_ and he used to be a Typhoon pilot! So sexy!" said the third girl looking up from the navigation charts, with a huge grin on her soft features.

Alexander had been on the bridge long enough to listen to the banter between the three girls, he chose then to give a little cough, before speaking, "You know if you wanted to know things about me, it would've been easier to ask."

The three of them jumped in unison, before snapping to attention, Alexander couldn't help but smile, "Encase you were going to digging through my personnel jacket later, I'll save you time..."

Alexander ran them through his file, as the three of them listened intently, even ran them quickly through the events that had happened to him here, in this reality.

"Wow Captain, that's some tale... sir, we're getting a message from City 08, and the President wants to talk to you..." said one of the three bridge bunnies.

Alexander took his command chair, and answered the transmission, "Captain Kross, what can I do for you, ma'am?"

The pink haired beauty on the other end, gave him a soft smile, "Congratulations on the new appointment Captain, I have a request of you, and the Seraphim, if you are willing that is?"

Alexander smiled back at the women, she reminded him of a pink haired girl that he knew in Orb, which had grown on him, "Of course ma'am, the navy is at your disposal. Might this have something to do with the summit between you, and the leaders of the nations of this earth?"

"You are a very bright one Captain; I can see that Jefferson made a good choice in giving you that ship. Yes, it has a lot to do with that, I would like the Seraphim to take me planet side, and serve as a place for the summit to take place. We were going to have it take place in the southern Pacific Ocean, just off the coast of a nation called Orb." Said the woman, as she fiddled with a pen on her desk.

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He sat at his new desk, looking over reports, and came across something odd, mentioning two Prisoners of War (P.O.W.'s), that had been captured during the fighting in space, and were currently in the brig, on his ship. As he came to the names, a smile came to his lips.

He'd just have to take a little walk down below to see for himself. Once he reached the brig, he ordered one of the marines standing watch to open the cell, as he walked in, he saw them, sitting on other sides of the room, staring each other down, when the door closed behind him, he spoke, "Well it's good to see you two again, I'm sure it must be a funny story as to why my wife's best friends are glaring at each other across the brig of _my_ ship."

His voice snapped them out of their little war with each other; it was the slender one with the copper blond hair the spoke up, "Alexander? What do you mean _your_ ship? I thought you flew Raptors?"

Alexander smirked a bit, and leaned against the door, before he spoke, "Well _'little sister'_," he paused to let those words sink into her, since she was the little sister of the version of him that was from this world, "that is a funny story, has to do with me pushing my luck, and being punished for upsetting the balance of this world. But since command took care of that..." he looked to the deck plating above them, well looking at the two women out of the corner of his jade green eyes.

The other woman, slipped off her bunk, and tilted her head to the side, letting her red lochs touch her shoulder, before she spoke, "What are you talking about Alex?" then it hit her, _Heaven's Base_. And she took on a look as if she just touched her own grave.

"So, it was one of you two that mentioned it, doesn't matter who did it, the fact is, that place is now a new man-made lake. And it's got everyone on the Earth and PLANT running for cover. "He smiled at the two of them for a moment, "Not that I can understand why or anything... But that now leaves the question of what to do with you two. I can't think that the Earth Forces are going to be too happy to get you back, and I can let you out of the brig right now."

"So what are you going to do? Just going to let us rot in here, or toss us into space?" asked Lily, as she clutched her hand closer to her ample chest.

Alexander pushed himself off of the wall, and walked up to Lilly, and patted her on the shoulder, before he spoke, "Right now, not much I can do, I can get you something clean to wear, and some time out of the brig to walk around, under escort of course. And I'll let Murrue know that you two are here, hell she'll probably know what your sizes are, so she'll know what to get from supply. And I'll see about getting you some better food too."

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Cagalli was looking out her window from her home, in the distance, she could see the shape of the U.N.S. ship floating just off shore, it was hard to make it out, even against the setting sun, it gave off this black shape, that she couldn't help but feel was a little foreboding, she knew that she was going to be heading over there in the morning, for a meeting with the leader of these people, along with a delegations from all over the world and PLANT, she gave a deep sigh, and turned her thoughts back to her shattered nation.

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Miriallia was steeping off of the transport craft, which had brought her, along with several other reporters to this massive metal leviathan that was sitting in the water just off her homeland. The craft was even bigger then she had thought it would be, it was almost a mile long, and it was bristling with weapon systems, it truly looked like a fortress. As she got up to a marine that was standing at the end of the loading ramp, getting everyone's I.D. and cheeking it against a list, she sighed and handed hers over.

"Haw, Miriallia. Freelance reporter.... Oh!" he said, before waving over another marine, they spoke quietly for a moment, before he turned back to her and said, "Fallow the Lance Corporal; he'll take you to see the Captain. I was ordered to keep an eye out for you, and have you brought to him right away, if you showed up."

Miriallia walked closely behind the Lance Corporal, as they made their way through the ship, to a lift, and up a few floors, before coming to a room, that overlooked the bow of the ship, it was stretched out before her, in a really impressive view, as she looked back to her guide, she noticed that he was gone. So she took out her camera and started to snap shots of the view, since she hadn't heard that she couldn't take pictures of the view.

She was just starting into her second memory card, when she heard the clicking of heels on metal, just after the hiss of the door being opened, but it was that sweet voice, that had made her feel that everything would be fine, during the war, that had got her to turn, and see someone that she really looked up to.

"Welcome aboard the B.B. 163 _Seraphim_, sorry that Alex has been delayed; he's been so busy with getting this new command squared away." She smiled at the younger girl standing in the room, looking a little dumb founded at her, and she continued, "But I'm glad you're here Miriallia, it's great to see you. And well sorry, but I'm still pulling firsts for us it seems."

Miriallia tilted her head to the left, as Murrue hugged her tightly, "How so?" was all she could ask.

"I'm going to be a mommy in a few more months it seems." Murrue gave the girl a sweet smile, her amber eyes alive with joyful tears.

Miriallia smiled a massively wide grin, "Do your parents know yet? I know Tim is going to love the idea of being an uncle."

She watched as Murrue's face fell a little, before she spoke, "No they don't know yet, it's kind of hard to send a message to people that you're fighting against. I just hope this summit goes well, so that, maybe I'll get a chance to tell them."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Alexander was sitting on the bridge alone, early in the morning, watching as the delegation craft departed from his ship, only a few days after they had arrived, he heard the door hiss open, then shut, followed by someone in heels almost stomping along the deck. He looked out of the corner of his left eye to see the president of City 08 walking up beside him, looking as if her knickers are in a knot.

"President Hibbiki is there something I can do for you?" he asked, not taking his eyes off the view.

It came out in a soft voice, that sounded so sweet to his ears, "Yes, no.... I mean yes, but if I tell you to do it, you won't since it's not a lawful order." As she turned to the coffee pot, and poured a cup, she looked back to Alexander.

"Well if we are talking orders or just _talking_ about what's bothering you?" he said, trying to see if she caught the hint.

She ran a hand through her hair, and let out a sigh, "What I'd like is for this ship to shoot down the flight from the Atlantic Federation... Even as badly as the blow to _Heaven's Base_ was, they are still regarded as the major power here. And they seem to still think that the U.N.S. started the war.... You and the crew of the _Victoria_ didn't, did you?"

Alexander took a sip from his cup, and stood, well motioning for her to take his chair, "Not that I can recall, it happened so fast, I was asleep in bed with Murrue, when the first shots rang out, and a couple went through our bedroom. I got us to the base as fast as I could, and Murrue was hurt along the way. Then we went to town on them, no sense in holding back."

President Hibbiki took the offer of the seat and flopped down in it, as he continued, "I'm guessing the summit didn't go very well, did it?"

She took a sip of the coffee, and made a face, at the bitter taste it held, "No Captain, it went swimmingly..." she sighed before she went on, "I have a bad feeling that this war isn't over yet, and that this ship is going to be forced into action to make some gunboat diplomacy.... I know, I know, _diplomacy is the art of telling someone to go to hell, in such a way, that they actually look forward to the trip_. That's what you in the Navy say about it, right?"

Alexander laughed a little, before he spoke, "I know that's how I define it. But how did the rest of the nations act though?"

She sighed again, "Orb was submissive entirely, and I think it had something to do with the Battleship sitting off shore, PLANT seemed to get on board, but I'm not entirely sure about them. As for the other smaller states and federations on the planet, they seemed to want to follow in the wake of the Atlantic Federation." And she started to rub the sides of her cup.

"So does that mean we are going to have to make an example of them?" he asked, placing his cup down on the nearby desk.

"Probably." Was all she said.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

It was early in the morning, as the massive leviathan started to move out from Orb waters, making its way to the pacific fleet base of the Atlantic Federation. Kira and his girlfriend were standing on the beach that had finally been cleaned up, as the craft started to pull away, as he looked to her, she said "Things are about to get very bad Kira, but the night is always darkest before the dawn."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"Mom, you might want to call dad, and have him come home early, and book a flight to Orb, soon!" called a young man, after he hung up the phone.

A woman in her late 40's looked at her son with his brown hair, and amber coloured eyes, "Why Tim? Is something wrong?"

Tim Ramius looked back to his mom, and repeated his conversation with Miriallia, and the look on his mother's face, told the story of how much fear she had for it.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

It happened quickly a group of five people, left an air-port and started to fly to the south pacific, they were just coming up on Hawaii when they saw it, a flight of Spearheads locked in a dogfight with Raptors, well parts of the islands burn, and in the distance, the pilot of the small jet saw it, a massive prow of a massive craft, slowly making its way towards them.

A voice cracked over the radio, "Small craft, this is an ID challenge, if you fail to comply, you will be fired upon." It was a woman's voice, and she sounded young.

The pilot grimaced before he responded, "This is Lt. Aden Ramius. I'm flying my family to Orb for a vacation, to see my sister and her husband."

The voice on the other end, closed the channel for a moment, then she came back with, "We are sending two Typhoons to escort you to a landing bay. You will land and be boarded."

Not ten minutes had passed, and their craft was in one of the landing bays of the massive ship, out the windows, the passengers could see men and women in white body armour, with weapons pointed at their craft. Two marines and a woman in a white uniform were walking towards the hatch on the side of the jet, once a stair way had been brought along side. The eldest man on the jet, opened the door, and looked down at the three people approaching the craft, when the woman looked up at him, he saw that under that white cap, was a mop of brown hair, and amber eyes, as she smiled to him, he smiled to her, and started to descend the stairs, as the rest of his family came down afterwards.

They stood facing one another for a moment, before he saluted her, and said "Permission to come about Commander."

The woman smiled, and returned the salute, "Permission granted," she took that moment to hug him, "it's good to see you dad. I see you brought Aden, Tim and mom too, but who is the other lady?"

"Hey Murrue, it's good to see you, sorry I couldn't make it to your wedding," said the pilot of the jet, as he walked over and hugged his younger sister, "But let me introduce you to my girl-friend Jenny Winston."

As if on cue, a woman with blond hair, and green eyes, and a nice build to her, despite the Earth Forces uniform that hugged her curves, gave Murrue a smile, and a little nod, before she spoke, "I met Aden on base a during the war," she squeezed Aden's left hand, "and we just kind of hit it off..."

Murrue dismissed the marines from the bay, and asked her family to come with her, to the observation deck, as she was walking, it was Aden that said it, and it caused her to miss a step, "Murrue, looks like you put on a little weight..."

She spun on her heel, to glair at her brother, "I'll have you know it's just temporary! Besides," she placed her hands on her growing belly, "this kind of weight I'm happy to put on, for a while."

It was her mother that caught it, and she grinned broadly, before she hugged her daughter, and said "Congratulations! I'm so happy for you and Alexander."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The war lasted only a few more days, once the _Seraphim_ made it to the mainland of the Atlantic Federation, and burned any base it came across, with missiles and beam weapons, the leaders of the Atlantic Federation begged for peace, calming that they were in the ones that caused this war. The U.N.S. forces set about stripping away the bulk of the military forces around the world, leaving them with just enough to defend their boarders, but not enough to make an attack on any other nation. However the biggest event, to happen in the fallowing time from what became known as the 'Victoria Incident' was the creation of a space station, a place for all the leaders of the world to meet, as well as being the main naval station for the U.N.S.. But it was more than that; it was the point from where the fleet would start to explore this universe, and all of its wonders.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Well that would be the end this time, I do hope that it's found to be a better ending then it was last time.


End file.
